Daddy Dearest
by Katariina Mariad
Summary: Riku's mom is dead." Wakka stared at Tidus like he was insane, "Sora's mom's in a light coma. Sora's dad is dying." In the kitchen, Sora dropped the phone. "And Riku's been kidnapped." A KH story with aspects of the Final Fantasy Series, "It's baaack."
1. Chapter 1

**Daddy Dearest Chapter One  
**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** September 5th 2008 501PM to September 9th 2008 1130PM

**Warning:** Only thing you need to worry about here is mild language and violence.

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

* * *

Riku sighed bored, his right hand up hanging his briefcase over his shoulder. He was early for school...again. Two hours early. Not that he wanted to be up for school that early every day. That's just how it was. Get up and out the house before his mother woke or he'd be in school nursing an imprint of his briefcase on his face all day. He was running a bit late today, but he had managed to get out the house before his half-sleep mother realized he was still there.

Unfortunately, she had noticed him leaving the house. Riku dodged and caught the water bottle thrown at his head, silently thanking the training fighting all those heartless and nobodies provided him with. "Sweet! It's cold too!" Riku smirked throwing the bottle up into the air and catching it. It was supposed to be unusually hot today, and he hadn't been able to weasel a bit of money out of his mom while she was in a good mood this week. "Thanks mom!" Riku called back.

"Get off my damn property boy!" The woman yelled louder than what was absolutely necessary for five-thirty in the morning. Riku shrugged and went along his way.

Two years since he contributed to the destruction of Destiny Islands, and the place was just about as boring as it was before it had been taken by the heartless. He silently wished something would pick up again. He had half a mind to start up something himself. Just...something to bring some action into the world. Day in and day out it was dodge his mother, go to school, hang out with Sora and the others, stop by the library to do his homework because Lord knows he was a dead man if he stepped inside his house while his mom was home, and then sneak into the house while his mother was sleeping so he could rest himself. It was quite boring really.

Riku didn't have much of an answer as to why his mother disliked him. She didn't hurt him physically, not anymore at least, she had stopped after he came back from missing for those years, but she made it crystal clear that she wasn't fond of the boy.

_"Riku? Where'd you learn to glare like that?"_

_"It's natural talent." 'Pfft, natural talent my ass. My mom glares at me like that. Though, it could be natural talent then, I suppose.'_ He remembered answering Sora's question and mentally commenting on his own answer when he was younger. The second he turned eighteen, he swore he was moving out.

On the subject of family, Riku had no idea where or who his father was, and he was determined to keep that a secret for as long as he could milk the excuses. His long running current shtick was his father was a relatively strict writer who had separated from his mother and moved out before he was born. Thanks to his mother's strong no nonsense attitude, anyone who questioned the truth of Riku's situation was deterred from attempting to figure out it's validity pretty quickly. Sora had tried to one day. His mother got put in jail for a few months. Riku knew right away he wished that Riku had told him his mom legally owned a shotgun. It did earn Sora and Riku some publicity for a while, since it wasn't every day someone could claim they shared classes with a person who's friend's mother shot said person in the leg.

Riku frowned at the memory. For him, it brought people who were more concerned about the situation at his home than ever. Apparently it also stirred hushed secrets and rumors and stares as well. Riku didn't think himself to be a stupid or dependent person at all. There were many times he could tell his mother was ready to go on a rampage and that he should leave the house lest he wind up being the one shot in the leg.

Days like that had been occurring more frequently however. Riku personally made it his business to avoid his mother as much as he could. Despite being well trained, he certainly didn't think he could bring himself to bust out a Dark Firaga or Way to the Dawn and use it against his own mother. Quite frankly, he didn't want to. His reputation was bad ass enough; he wanted people to leave him to his thoughts, not run from him in fear of the unknown.

Riku took a detour to the currently quiet park next to the always quiet Library. The park and library had become his mental saviors over the years. Since the first time he had met Sora wailing because he had hurt himself while playing on one of the smaller swing sets, to the first time Sora told him about the secret hideout, to the first time he had come home in fourth grade and his mother had been home, all the way to the time Sora properly introduced him to Kairi. The times he had become official friends to Tidus, Wakka and Selphie; the many times he had helped the smaller generations with their own cuts and bruises in between his sitting on the library steps reading a book. All the way up to the first time he thought about there being other worlds and his wanting to leave the Islands to find them if they did exist, and the most recent event, the first time he found a bento box with his name on it, sitting on one of the park benches.

Much like his situation today, with only a few variations, he had gotten up later than usual and just barely made it out his house alive. He forgot his briefcase for school, the money he managed to get out his mom for the week for lunch, and even the small snack he had fixed himself for breakfast the night before in his mad dash to avoid the lamp and other items she was throwing at him. He was still a few hours early for school.

Considering he had nothing for the school day, he really had considered not going and to just take the hit to his rarely absent from school record. He had sat pondering the options while sitting on a park bench. When he decided that he wasn't going to waste his time sitting in school starving with none of the required material, he had noticed the small lunch sitting next to him. Underneath the lunch was his briefcase, along with a bit of munny.

He remembered looking around cautiously wondering who had brought his items to him. He carefully went through his items checking to see if anything was off. And that was when he heard the male's velvet chocolate voice, "I may be cruel, but I am not evil."

He looked around frantically, surprised that he didn't find anyone. "Maybe that was all just in my head." He remembered telling himself. So he picked up his stuff and walked slowly to school, having changed his mind. He found himself looking up at the sky as he walked, "Cloud's look beautiful today."

Riku smiled at the memory. That was the first time he heard the man. He was about nine at the time and had been used to the whole, avoid mom as much as he could, deal. The times he screwed up, he was there. If he had forgotten his munny or lunch or anything of the sort, he was there. He remembered the man talking him through the homework as he sat frustrated with it; one time when he had finished his History homework, he asked himself, "What does the past have to do with today?" The man replied with his deep sultry voice, "The events of the past influence those of today and the future. Without the past, there would be no present or future."

The man had made Riku begin to wonder about fate and his importance in the world and universe. It was that man, who made Riku wonder if there were other worlds out there, and it was the same man who influenced Riku's want to find these worlds, if they did exist.

He had forgotten about the man during his adventures in the darkness; the man had not forgotten him. The second Riku had screwed up on his resumed daily routine, the man was there. Sometimes, he even appeared when he was with Sora and Kairi, and not when he was alone like he usually did originally. And it seemed that man appeared once more, on this ridiculously warm day at six AM.

Riku looked over to the munny pouch sitting on the bench a bit away from him. Behind the bench stood a man with silver hair reaching his shoulders and teal green eyes with black catlike pupils. He was wearing the most complicated outfit of black leather Riku had ever seen. How he wasn't burning up wearing it was beyond him. "Niisan couldn't make it." The boy said with a smile. The boy had a hand resting on the bench.

"Who the hell-?"

"He says he'll be back tomorrow hopefully." The male turned around casually, "He wanted me to tell you-" the boy coughed, "-you really should stop forgetting your munny, unless you're planning on going on a diet of some kind and haven't told me yet." Riku stared at the boy wide-eyed. He had mimicked the man's voice perfectly. "See ya!" The boy grinned and disappeared in a burst of green energy.

Riku slowly walked towards the bench and picked up the munny pouch. "Thanks." He sighed and decided he'd rather get to school way early instead of risking meeting up with more people who looked exactly like him.

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~

"Look, I'm telling you. Out there, there's a world, with a city on it."

"Tidus, wanna rethink that sentence?" Riku smirked taking a sip from his water. Lucky him got lunch today.

"Oh shut it, I'm just trying to figure out how to word what I dreamed." Tidus folded his arms, with a finger touched to his chin. Kairi and Selphie leaned in eagerly towards Tidus, hoping to hear more of his dream. Wakka was banging his head against the lunch table.

"How many more times am I gonna have to hear your variations of the same story?"

"I think it's awesome." Sora commented with a smile.

"It's only awesome to you 'cause you find this world boring." Wakka slammed his head against the table once more. "I heard this story four times already. The first one ended with some black haired guy being turned into a vampire and the fourth one ended with some chick wearing a pink dress getting stabbed by some silver haired green eyed guy, ya?"

Riku opened his eyes at the mention of a green eyed male, "Cat like pupils?"

"Yeah!" Tidus jumped up pointing to Riku, "Poor chick was stabbed in the back in some fucked up execution style makeover. Was praying too! See! You had the same dream too didn'tcha!?"

"You're causing a scene." Selphie pulled Tidus down. He had been standing on his chair. Students around the table snickered and commented jokingly. Tidus sat with a blush.

"Did you really have a dream too Riku?" Kairi questioned looking at him.

Riku shook his head, "Nothing besides the norm for me." Riku took a bite of his fish sandwich. He remembered how much he loved these things when he was younger. He didn't have them often these days though. Lady luck just happened to make it so it he never had any munny when the school served it. "Tell us about this city on this world." Riku egged Tidus on.

Tidus grinned, Kairi and Selphie leaned in once more, Sora smiled reminded of the various worlds he had gone to on his adventures and Wakka groaned. Wakka had all his classes with Tidus. From the looks of it, Riku guessed Tidus had been trying to get Wakka to listen to the whole story all day.

"So, here's how it goes. I'll give you the in tact town version."

"In tact town version?" Sora questioned

"He's got an assload of versions of what this place looks like in his head. The place really has had a lot of crap happen to it. Something about an upper level plate falling on a lower section of the place and then a meteor beating the crap out of it." Wakka mumbled.

"What he said." Tidus smiled sheepishly pointing a thumb towards his friend. "So, this place, it's got two levels, an upper level, built over the "ground level" if you could call it that. Separating the two levels are 8 plates...I think, connected to each other through a series of "railways" and "reactors". These sections on the lower level, surround some very tall building that's got at least 50 floors right in the center of the whole place."

"Sectors....?" Selphie commented, as though she wasn't sure of herself.

Riku looked around, shrugged his shoulders and decided to throw something out there, "Sector 7..." He wasn't sure exactly what "Sector 7" by itself referred to, but with Tidus' explanations of his dreams came flashes of images and these terms.

"Had a plate dropped on it-"

"It killed practically everyone in that slum hole-"

"Stupid Shin-Ra Corp." Wakka lifted his head from the table, Riku and Tidus looked at Selphie, Kairi and Sora who had replied to Riku's burst of random comments.

"Did we...all have the same dream?" Tidus questioned.

"I know exactly why I didn't need you trying to tell me the dang thing, ya." Wakka replied. "The second you finished telling me the first time I knew exactly what you were talking about, ya? Don't ask me how."

"I don't remember dreaming something like that." Selphie added her two cents.

"I'd remember if I had a dream that weird." Sora replied. "And I'm known for my weird dreams."

"Personally I'm too confused about what the hell I did dream." Riku commented, "You've been going on and on about these places and this world for weeks now."

"I didn't know what you were talking about until you started talking about it." Kairi replied. Always the observant one. "I was pretty confident that I didn't dream about a city as weird as that before you mentioned it. I've not dreamed for some time actually." Kairi sighed and tapped her head with a finger, "Now I'm not so sure. Did I dream that or was it just you?"

Riku finished up the last of his sandwich while the others debated on dreams. Occasionally Tidus would start talking more about how that town looked. Whenever he mentioned it, Riku could see flashes of images...'Or were they memories?'...in his head.

Luckily before the group got too confused, the bell for the next class rang.

~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~

"Friday afternoon, the start of the weekend. No homework whatsoever. Beautiful weather." Tidus looked around with a smile, "You thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Um...mini beach party?" Selphie questioned. The group of six walked off the school campus. Riku once again had his briefcase slung over his shoulder, which was how he conventionally held it. He was falling a bit behind the group, a bit preoccupied with looking around for who knows what.

"Exactly!" Tidus and Wakka slung their arms around each other punching their fists into the air.

"While we're partying, I can tell you guys about that dream I had when I fell asleep during Science." Tidus grinned

"How you managed to fall asleep in that class is beyond me." Kairi commented.

Riku continued to fall further behind still looking up and around. 'Wakka...don't you dare-'

"We'll meet up at Riku's house in two hours ya? It'll give the slow dressing chicks some time to get ready."

'-say that.' Riku thought watching Kairi and Selphie whack Wakka with their book bags. 'He always says that.' Riku hung his head down and sighed. 'And mom's off from work today...'

"Slowpoke!" Sora called out tackling Riku with a smile. The two fell to the ground in a heap. The others were now too far away to notice. "You're looking around as if you were expecting an alien gummy ship to come beam you up or something."

Riku laughed, "Not exactly." Riku stood and looked around one more time. 'Nothing...' He thought, 'Not even his brother.' Riku's smile disappeared altogether and turned into somewhat of a frown. He took off in a brisk walk.

"Riku! Wait up!" Sora called after him.

"What are you doing home?" Riku died just a bit inside. His mother just happened to be standing next to the door. He really considered turning around and hanging out in his school uniform.

"I had no homework. I'll be gone before you realize I'm still here a half hour later!" Riku yelled running upstairs to his room. His mother glared up the stairs and called out after him.

"Stupid bastard son!"

Riku sighed pressing himself against the closed door. Every insult his mother threw at him contained the word bastard. "Thank Kingdom Hearts I don't live next to the others." Riku hurried to get changed. He never noticed the simple letter sitting on his desk.

"Why do you keep saying we're gonna meet up at Riku's house? Every time we go over there he's running out the door while his mom's throwing things at him." Kairi questioned.

"It's called manly caring." Tidus nodded with his arms folded. Sora busted out laughing. "See, if Riku happens to fuck up and get knocked out by whatever his mom's throwing at him, we'll be there to see it happen, ya?" Kairi and Selphie glared at the two boys. Selphie was cracking her knuckles. Annoyed Selphie was scary. "I wasn't done." Wakka put his hands up in defense. "If we're there to see it happen, we can help him after he gets knocked out, ya?"

"Not to mention it's always funny how he manages to catch whatever she throws and throw it back through the crack of the closing door." Tidus snickered.

"Riku!" Kairi called out. They were two houses down from Riku's place, but she could easily see Riku twist around, catch the butcher knife thrown at him mid twist, and throw it back so it easily passed through the space of the closing door right before it closed completely. Riku was now facing the front door.

"You like that knife! Quit throwing it at me!"

"The only thing I like about that knife is the speed it gets when throwing it at you! Bastard son!" He heard his mom yell through the door.

"At least I didn't get you! I could have if I wanted to!"

"You find that amusing, huh?" Selphie smacked the three boys upside the head. Sora and Tidus weren't laughing anymore. Wakka was looking starry-eyed at Riku.

"He's so playing blitzball with us when we're done developing it, ya?."

"WAKKA!" Selphie yelled kicking him in the shin. Kairi had run over to check on him. Sora followed shortly after.

"Look, he Sora, and Kairi went to different worlds for goodness sakes and came back alive. We've no need to worry about them, ya?" Wakka looked at Selphie while holding his shin.

"But still-!"

"Selphie, darling, look. We've been watching Riku do that catch and throw back deal for years now. In all those years, he's only been hit once and that was only 'cause he forgot Kairi instinctively yells at him to watch out and that distracted him. He's like a super human or something." Tidus placed a hand on Selphie's shoulder. "He'll be fine."

"Sorry you had to see that." Riku waved with the hand he had caught and thrown the knife with.

"AHHH!!!!!' The other's screamed.

"How the hell did we miss that!?" Sora yelled staring at the blood running down his hand.

Riku stared at his hand, "Well, shit....Maybe I shouldn't have caught the thing by the blade." Riku smiled sheepishly.

"You're just as bad as Sora!" Kairi yelled

Tidus nudged Wakka's side with his elbow, "Where the heck did that come from?" he whispered to him. The duo looked down at the clear container full of some kind of green liquid. Sitting underneath it was a letter, with Riku's name on it.

"Hey, Riku?" Riku looked over to the two, "You've got mail?" Wakka and Tidus pointed to the bottle.

"A potion?" Sora and Kairi looked at the items confused.

Riku smiled, picked up the potion and poured a bit on his wound before downing the rest. A few seconds later he was reading the letter, the wound on his hand gone. The others leaned over his shoulder reading the letter along with him. It was short, semi-sweet and to the point.

_"Who are you trying to be? Cloud? Showoff. You've a long way to go."_

Riku laughed at the letter. Everyone else was confused.

Selphie squealed, "You've a secret admirer you're not telling us about don't you!?"

Riku took a step back and stared at her as though she were insane, "More like a guardian of sorts." Riku smiled and walked off, stuffing the letter in his pants pocket. "Now, who wants me to kick their butts in a sparring match?"

"You mean, who wants me to kick their butt!" Sora yelled chasing after him.

"Hey! Don't forget about my dream!"

"I'd love nothing more than to do that, ya!"

"He's good at changing the subject."

"And Sora's good for falling for it every time." Selphie and Kairi sighed hanging their heads. When they looked up there was a male with long silver hair and teal eyes with catlike pupils standing as though he was bored in front of them. The two girls took a step back.

"Who are you?" Kairi called out her Keyblade. 'I'm getting better at this.' She thought. Sora had given the blade back to her when they got back home. Selphie was mentally trying to figure out how to use her jump rope as a weapon.

The male scratched his head with his head tilted to the side, "I don't feel like fighting right now. You can put that thing away." Kairi relaxed from her badly performed battle stance. She still gripped her blade tightly. "Do us a favor won't you?" The boy glanced back at Riku.

Selphie focused on the features of the man; this definitely wasn't the one who struck down the woman in Tidus' dream. He did look like him though. "What do you want us to do?"

"It's in your best interest to make sure he doesn't die."

"Wha-?"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean!?" Selphie and Kairi yelled.

"Nii-san's not been as direct," The boy drawled on, aware of Riku and his friends running back towards him and the girls, "and now we're losing the chance." The male looked down at the two with sad eyes. "Mother's being such an asshole..." The male disappeared in a burst of green just as the others got back to them.

"You guys alright?" Sora ran up to Kairi.

"We're...fine." Kairi and Selphie looked at Riku. He was partially blocked by Tidus and Wakka.

"That guy looked just like you Riku." Selphie commented.

"What did he want?" Riku stepped closer to the two girls. The serious and concerned look on his face was slightly disturbing to Kairi. 'That wasn't him...He's too short...' Riku thought.

Kairi looked around and shook her head, "Not here." Riku couldn't help but think there was something adventurous about to occur and this time, he was more in the middle of it than Sora.

* * *

**Notes:  
**Not bad for four pages of type in my opinion. The Second chapter will be up next weekend or earlier, depending on how fast I am with writing up more chapters.

If you didn't notice, here's a **Hint: **"Cloud's look beautiful today." - that's a grammatical error on purpose.  
I also make another major, but not so obvious hint in the last bit of the chapter. It appears more than once though.

Riku's mom is an asshole. Hands down. She's like that for a reason though. She's particularly odd as you'll see in later chapters.

If you don't know the game FINAL FANTASY: Mystic Quest, you should head on over to the final fantasy wikia. Just google it. I'm feeling lazy today. Characters from there will be appearing. It's the black sheep of the Final Fantasy series and many wouldn't even consider it part of the whole series, but I like Mystic Quest more than most Final Fantasy games. Some characters, like people in real life, just don't get the respect they deserve.

**Edit:** If you wanna see FFVI let me know. I've never heard of FFVI until KHII. O.o I'm gonna need some background information and if you want any GOOD white or silvered haired folk to appear. No characters that were killed/defeated during the plot of the original game please.

The story's is not too bad right now, but it does get worse...very quickly. The Mature rating is there for a reason. Don't take it too lightly. I thank you for reading and hope you enjoyed the chapter. ^-^


	2. Chapter 2

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Outlined:** September 5th 2008 501PM to September 9th 2008 1130PM

**Originally Written:** September 5th 2008 501 PM to October 5th 2008 349AM

**Warning:** The first fight of the story is here! And it's not shy at all. Beware of blood. And the chopping off of limbs.

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

* * *

Riku shuffled towards his bed completely intending on getting some sleep. He and the others had done quite a bit of sparring and racing on the secret island. Even Tidus, Wakka and Selphie joined in with the practice fighting. Riku rubbed his shoulder; Wakka could pitch that blitzball quite hard. "That ball really should be declared a dangerous weapon," Riku muttered.

He was in a bit of a bad mood. He enjoyed sparring and racing with the others, but it didn't feel as wholesome and entertaining as it usually was. "He wasn't there. Neither his...brothers." Riku laid down on his bed with a sigh. This feeling of something being wrong didn't help him either. The warning one of the brothers had told Kairi and Selphie didn't help things in the least. "Make sure I don't die...?" That warning only intensified the whole feeling even further.

Riku looked over to his desk. Why he had the thing confused him, he was rarely home to use it. Nonetheless, there on his desk was an unopened letter. A few wisps of green rose from the letter, prompting Riku to actually go examine the thing.

"One is but a dream; a protector of fayth." Riku reread the sentence, "And faith is spelled like that why?" He commented. Riku sat at his desk and continued reading the excruciatingly short note. "One is for all that is holy and just; the realm of light all for them to command. Three guardians of memory. The last one's struggle will be eternal." Riku blinked at the letter and laughed, "What was the writer of this smoking, and where can I get some?" He never noticed the woman standing behind him. She'd fierce deep green eyes and deep green hair reaching her shoulders. She covered herself with a relatively skimpy green and gold tunic, long hanging arm sleeves and gold and green boots reaching her mid thigh. For one who looked well over 40 she was wearing the outfit well.

"Well, I'll be. Disrespectful child!" Riku sharply turned around standing up to face the woman. The chair clattered against the ground loudly.

"Who the hell-?"  
"Sleep child!" The woman yelled thrusting out her hand. A mist of fine blue particles blew in Riku's face, and suddenly, he was quite tired. Riku fell to the ground with a moan, asleep.

The woman smiled, "Nearly 2000 years and I still got it." She peered over Riku's sprawled out form, "Maybe I went a little overboard." She picked up Riku, who was surprisingly way lighter than he looked to be, and placed him on his bed. "No matter. Poor child is going to need all the rest he can get." She looked toward the letter still sitting on his desk. "...Kaeli?" The woman turned around facing the door.

Standing in the doorway was a woman wearing a simple green cotton tank top and matching pants that flared at the knees. She was holding a simple black wallet "Rydia...I thought it was you making all that rattle in my house." She walked over to the other woman.

"Considering your age, you look gorgeous darling." Rydia hugged Kaeli tightly, "How are you holding up?"

Kaeli brushed a few locks of Riku's hair out of his face, her own yellowing locks falling forward hiding her face, "The hardest thing to do in the world, is make your own son believe you despise him." She then placed the wallet she was holding onto his bed, and pulled out a single picture. She placed both the wallet and picture in Riku's hand. "Any reason for placing such a strong sleep spell on him?"

Rydia laughed nervously, "He does need his rest..."

Kaeli looked down at the picture, "He'll be out until tomorrow night with a spell of that caliber."

"Well then, we'll just have to let Firion and Edge know to meet up over here instead."

"And Cloud-?"  
"Will be drawn naturally to the chaos. Vincent will be thrown off a touch, but his tracking ability is superb. He'll be able to meet up with Riku just as planned." Kaeli turned to leave the room.

"You're welcome to stay the night." She looked back at Riku, "I guess I should get to shining my Axe." She said with a smile, "If it wants you, it'll have to kill me first to get to you."

Rydia watched Kaeli leave with a sad smile. "The odds are against us, friend. How long has it been?" Rydia asked herself looking down at the picture held between Riku's hands. "I suppose I should be happy with knowing what destroyed our worlds many moons ago. Perhaps at the end of all this, we'll finally be able to truly rest."

~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~

Traverse town's first district was in sheer chaos. In fact, all of Traverse Town's residents were in deep trouble. The first district was currently being destroyed in a devastating battle. A paladin with dark gray eyes and wavy dark silver hair reaching his shoulders dressed in silver and blue armor with a connecting matching cape battled, more like dodged, a green eyed bluish-gray skinned female-resembling being with borderline ridiculously long silver hair. It was wearing, if you could even call it that, a black bikini set that left little to the imagination. No shoes, no other clothing items, just that bikini outfit. Tendrils of black, gray and red machinery stuck out of it's back, head and arms and wrapped about it's arms. Even with the restrictions that the Paladin believed the wrappings would place upon it, it moved damned quickly.

The losing Paladin didn't have a chance when he was brutally drop kicked and thrown into Traverse Town's old accessory shop. His longsword, a silver blade covered in ancient Runes with a silver, black and navy blue hilt and handle that matched his armor somewhat, lodged into the ground blade first a bit aways from him. He stood shakily, and coughed up a bit of blood. "It hits hard." He breathed.

The Paladin looked ahead of him. Between him and this entity was his sword, "My Lightbringer." He switched his gaze between his blade and the being for a few seconds. Then he made a mad dash for his weapon of choice. At the same time it screeched loudly, a high pitched scream that sent shivers down the Paladin's back and made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. It dashed towards the Paladin while it screeched.

The Paladin managed to get to his sword, pull it out the ground and slash it's torso just as one of it's clawed hands slashed the side of his face leaving three long bleeding gashes. At the same time a Wind Shuriken flew at the duo and smacked the female being right in the temple. A mixture of dark and neon green blood flew through the air. Some of it landed on the Paladin's face.

A gray haired, green eyed "Ninja" wearing black lightweight brigantine armor that left the upper left side of his torso bare, silver loose fitting lightweight pants and black decorated knee high boots landed next to the Paladin kneeling on a knee. Another wind Shuriken was safely secured on his back. "Cecil! You okay?"

"Besides the fact you just infected me even more, you arrived at the nick of time Edge." The Paladin said sarcastically wiping the blood the best he could with his hand.

Edge slammed a fist into the ground. He just noticed the bleeding wound on Cecil's face. "Shit..." Cecil's blood was getting mixed with the blood of the entity. He could barely see through his right eye. The green blood singed and smoked against his skin.

Cecil performed a backflip and Edge fell to the ground dodging the Shuriken that the entity had thrown back at them. It screeched again loudly. The duo stood. Cecil swung his sword around a few times while Edge unhooked the Shuriken secured on his back.

It lunged at them once more. Cecil valiantly charged towards it swinging his sword, slicing through it's torso and throwing it up into the air. Edge jumped up and rebounded off of Cecil's shoulders and threw his shuriken, stabbing it in the torso making the wound Cecil had started even worse. It landed on the ground with a thud and fell silent. Edge landed in front of Cecil tapping his chest.

Cecil dropped his sword and fell to a knee holding his face and wiping at the blood on him.

"Cecil!" Edge ran back to him and used his own cloth from his pants to wipe the blood off as best he could. Behind them the being stood slowly. It's blood that was soaking into Edge's cloth and the ground turned into a neon green gas and returned to it. Cecil and Edge looked back towards it noticing the effect. It pulled the Shuriken out of it with ease. "I thought you were joking when you said-"

"Why would I joke about something like that?" Cecil turned to Edge sharply.

Within seconds it was perfectly healed and there was no evidence to show that it had been hurt in the first place. Edge whipped out a few smaller Shuriken and started throwing them wildly at it while Cecil prepared to force Edge to the ground so he could perform a low strike.

"Get down!" BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

Cecil and Edge simultaneously jumped up and drop-kicked the entity sending it flying back away from them. All the while bullets flew just in front of their heads at a diagonal embedding themselves into the enemy. It fell to the ground in a screeching rage.

"Some beings just don't know how to stay dead." A being decked in black leather covered in equally black wide belts said calmly, swishing his red velvet cloak to the side. He lowered his hand which held a three barreled gun.

Next to him landed a man wearing an orange, blue, and brown striped bandana haphazardly tying back wild, spiky white hair. Whatever the headband didn't cover was tied back into a low ponytail reaching the middle of his back. He also wore a tied red cape over his chest with a golden clasp, a navy blue half shirt with matching arm socks/warmers. A thick brown belt, from which most of his various weapons hung from was looped around a pair of beige pants covered with navy blue shin guards. Feet covered by brown boots shifted accordingly as pale blue eyes stared at the red eyed man standing on his right. "Only you would say something like that."

The other male gave him a look. "Aren't you supposed to be somewhere Cecil?"

"It's fast." Cecil replied holding his wounded stomach. "Strong as well. It managed to get ahead of me. Firion," Cecil turned towards the man wearing the headband. Vincent, the other male, kept shooting at the entity while Edge threw smaller shuriken to help him out, "you've been dealing with this the longest out of all of us."

"He's right. Your call. What do we do?" Edge called back. A mist of green was forming around the entity in a cloud.

"Rydia and Kaeli can't hold this thing off alone. We need to make sure at least one of us gets there before it. Edge. Take Cecil." Firion looked at the two males respectively, "Go back to Radiant Garden."

Cecil gave Firion a look of shock as if to ask what he was thinking. The wheels in his head started turning however, and he realized he'd be a dead man if he kept fighting in his condition. Never mind the fact he was around 2000 years old already. He trusted Firion's judgment. He heard from Rydia the cruel fate of his adoptive siblings Leon and Maria along with their friend Guy as well as his other comrades just from the attack of this being. That was already on top of the losses from the war against someone named Emperor Palamecia. He wondered just how old Firion was. To have found someone who had seen much more than he and Luneth had was quite a feat to him.

Cecil looked down at Lightbringer, gripped tightly in his hand.

"Don't even think about it." Firion replied. "I've enough weapons and memories from them to last for the rest of my lifetime." Firion pulled off a thin yet sturdy black bow from his back. "Yoichi Bow....Maria's strongest weapon. The distance I gain will keep it from tackling and absorbing me." None of the men had to ask. It wasn't about whether or not he'd be able to shoot fast enough. Firion didn't have a choice.

Vincent was still shooting to keep the entity down quickly reloading while it was recovering when necessary. "I'm running low on bullets." He said simply.

"Get moving!" Firion yelled firing his bow. A long black blade with a blood red hilt blocked Firion's arrow and Vincent's bullets. Holding that sword was a woman with red eyes and dark silver hair wearing a black leather outfit complete with high-heeled boots, elbow-length gloves and a unique top that folded back down to resemble a vest. A single black feathered wing poked out from her right shoulder blade. The tendrils and coils of machinery still remained.

"I didn't think she was one as well." Vincent said quietly. He glanced over to Cecil and Edge, "The Gullwings are still in Radiant Guardian; they've been staying there who knows how long. All the more reason for you to go."

Edge turned back and forth from the Gullwing standing in the middle of a green mist to Vincent and Firion, "Are you-"

"It's now a fairy with the ability to turn human sized. I think we can handle it like this." Firion put back his bow and arrows and unsheathed a completely silver longsword with some sort of incantation etched into the blade.

"Which is why you just took out Ragnarok, right?" Edge replied with a slight smile. The girl charged at them performing a jumping slash directed at Firion.

"Get going...now!" Firion yelled as he expertly blocked it's attack. Vincent dodged the attack and the force of the two energies in their swords and spirits combining. He lodged a few bullets into it's side.

Cecil finally wearily grabbed Edge who was standing looking concerned at the fight, and dragged him out the world exit to their own Gummiship. "This is for everyone you've destroyed...!" Firion swung his sword. Vincent knocked the blade out of the female's right hand. The sword disappeared and the hand turned back into the sick gray of the original entity. Firion proceeded to slice off it's left arm and impale it with Ragnarok.

He said a quick chant in a language Vincent couldn't decipher. "Flare!" He called out as the sword glowed red and bursts of hot red flames surrounded the being. He looked over to Vincent. "It wasn't much, but I seriously needed to do that."

Vincent nodded in understanding, "That won't finish it though."

"It's unlike any being I've ever encountered. At least 100 times stronger than the Emperor. And it's virtually immortal with those regenerative cells it has. Vincent, they're expecting you there more than I. It won't take it long to regenerate. With the power of Chaos you've a much higher chance at surviving should it make it's way to Destiny Islands. I don't doubt it will."

Vincent nodded and turned to leave. He understood. One day, he would be nearly 100,000 years old and wishing for a valiant death as Firion did. "You'll probably be taken to be reunited with it, since you're infected. If this plan works, you'll most likely die once it's gone."

Firion stared at the mist of green his sword was lost in. "Give me your strength..." Firion pulled out a long gray ax from another belt with loops on the back wrapped around his waist. 'The war against Emperor Palamecia was fierce, and if you happened to run across a weapon you didn't know how to use in battle and it was the only resort you had, you were better off being dead. Even the Monk Josef knew how to handle a good weapon.' Firion thought. 'The rune axe should help to keep it at bay even if only a little while.' The blade of the axe, as it name suggested, had runes engraved in it. Many of Firion's and the others weapons were old and had to be restored multiple times. Each time, more power and ability was put into it. It was said this being was a spare user of magic. Firion hoped that the rumor was truth. "Good luck Vincent."

Vincent nodded standing at the entrance to Traverse Town, "Have my luck. You need it more than I do."

* * *

**Notes**

Two sites that'll give you much of the information you'll need on any character/weapons/abilities found in this story. This site doesn't like links in a story so just take out the spaces. :)  
http :// finalfantasy. wikia. com  
http :// kingdomhearts. wikia. com  
If you want a less in depth look at the final fantasy characters try here  
http :// www. ffcompendium. com

Just smack me in a review if you want me to leave out my hints. XD  
Info on the different characters appears in the order they're mentioned/introduced. That's why even though you don't see Firion until the end of the chapter, his information comes up earlier alongside Edge.

Rydia is from Final Fantasy IV. Kaeli is from Final Fantasy Mystic Quest. Kaeli's a brunette. And yes (hint) she's turning blond for a reason.

Good thing I'm rereading everything I post. I nearly forgot about that picture Kaeli handed Riku. XD

Firion and Edge are from Final Fantasy II. Just in case, Cloud's from Final Fantasy VII.

I know Traverse Town probably disappeared when Sora saved the worlds in the first game, but that just feels like a waste of a really cool world. And I needed a world that wouldn't mind too much if people beat the snot out of it. I could have used a Disney World, maybe, but that would have just confused things as this story doesn't touch upon any Disney aspect.

Cecil's from FFIV. The head man actually. Is Cecil pronounced "Sih-Sel" or "Sih-Seal"? There's a bit of a debate in my head concerning that.

If you've ever played FFVII or even watched at least the very beginning of FFVII: Advent Children, that intro thingy, you should have an idea of what they're fighting. I refuse to call it "her" (I only did it at the end because she changed into a female). And I made it screech 'cause it sounds/looks cool in my head. I'm glad you never really see what it really looks like throughout the entire series; gave me a lot of leeway on what I could do with it. It's blood is neon green, it lives off the lifestream of other planets last I checked. And yes, it morphs, using the natural abilities of those it morphs into...and then some. *looks around*

That huge Shuriken on Edge's profile image is never given a "real name". So Sasuke from Naruto came along and bopped me on the head, "Looks like a Fuma/Wind Shuriken to me (loser)."

Vincent, but not his really cool entrance, is from Final Fantasy VII. I called him vampire boy until I found out he wasn't really a vampire at all. Still, old habits die hard. The three barreled gun is Cerberus. Firion's entrance is loosely based on Kairi's entrance in the Animated (can I call it that?) fighting movie Dead Fantasy II. Dead Fantasy is mentioned on the Final Fantasy Wikia page.

The Gullwings are mentioned in Final Fantasy X-2, made up of characters from both Final Fantasy X and X-2.

* * *

*cheers* An informational review and hits. Thanks a lot for reading. I'm so glad people are at the very least looking at my story. Gotta love that accomplished feeling. The next chapter will be up next week or sooner.

This chapter before the disclaimer and notes were thrown in has over 1100 less words than chapter one did. I tend to keep my chapters short though. There's been quite a few times where I've tried reading a 20-30 page chapter on this site, just to get caught up having to do something else. It's not fun trying to find your place again; even if the story is really good. This doesn't mean I'll never write a 10+ page chapter though; a chapter is however long it wants to be.

I keep forgetting not to eat while reading this story. XD


	3. Chapter 3

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** Sunday, October 5th 2008 440PM to Tuesday, October 7th 2008 442AM (before writing warning scene)/ 727AM

**Warming:** This is the first crazy chapter of the story. It's got gore near the end. Don't yell at me for reading this chapter while ingesting food/drink please. You'll know when you get to the gore part. It's not as bad as the warning makes it, or maybe that's because I typed an reread that scene like 20 times, but it is gory. I have a weak stomach and an intolerance for pain. The warning is mainly for the folks like me who have weak stomachs, think they can handle it anyway, and find out they can't.

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

**Beginning Note:** 1/5 of this is notes. I tacked them on at the end.

* * *

Sora, Kairi and Wakka relaxed outside of Sora's house waiting for Tidus and Selphie to return from checking up on Riku. His mom had said that he hadn't been feeling well and was sleeping. She then suggested that they go have a bit of fun without him. She hadn't said it so nicely, but they all got the hint very quickly.

Throughout the day, the group of five hung out on at each others houses, doing anything that would make this boring Saturday fun and adventurous. Every once in a while they took turns in groups of two heading to Riku's house and checking on him. The silver haired man's words from the other day hung thick in the air.

BOOM! Kairi and Wakka cheered at the orangey explosion in the sky. Sora was standing on top of the roof of his house, with the help of his Hi-jump ability and some damn good balance, lighting some strange orange bombs and throwing them in the air. They exploded creating decorative smoke clouds.

Sora decided to test the exploding items out after his mother had said she was going to be out all night with a few friends. Sora had guessed she was over at Riku's house. Somehow his mother, Pheobe, managed to friend "Crazy Kaeli". Sora shivered at that aspect reminded of the time she shot him in the leg.

A long while back, good old Tidus had dared him into checking out Riku's house. Rumor was she had a Giant yellow and white Axe hanging on the kitchen wall. Then Wakka had come along and double dared him: "Spy on Riku's house and see if the rumors about his family life are true." Sora had admitted Wakka's dare was "lame" and that "if Riku's home life was something that Riku wanted to reveal he would have done so already", but he had done it anyway. Sora never found out if she had the Axe that day, but he did discover she had a small handgun and was a great shot with it.

Phoebe was a pure blond. With deep golden yellow hair as wild as Sora's. Somehow it was more tamed; much of it stuck out to the left as though it was blown that way. She'd deep cobalt blue eyes, way darker than Sora's own sky blue eyes. She was a strong woman, a bit ditsy, but as strong as women tended to get. And there was no way in hell she was gonna let him live if she ever found he was doing this. Sora laughed, 'Oh well. I could always just glide and jump out the way of those arrows she loves shooting so much.'

Sora thought back to when she had first shown him the sturdy wooden bow and the silver tipped arrows. She had a strange habit of going down to the beach side and shooting arrows with letters attached to them out towards the ocean. They flew really far most times going out of Sora's vision before he saw them fall in the ocean. That was his mom's habit. "It keeps me from acting like Crazy Kaeli," she told him with a laugh one day. After he was shot, the nickname for the stern woman stayed.

A few people were outside watching the spectacle. The more adult viewers had house phones and cell phones in their hands with the ambulance set to speed dial. They were used to Sora and Riku's strange abilities after they had returned, but this one baked the cake.

"Did Sora ever say where he got the things from?" Wakka asked jumping up in excitement as another bomb exploded in the air. He and Kairi were watching Sora from the sidewalk in front of Sora's house. Wakka was now standing, and Kairi preferred to remain sitting.

Sora lit and tossed another object into the air. Why he was better with a sword or keyblade than a set of bow and arrows was beyond him. He had watched his mother work with her Bow of Grace and Silver Arrows since his father, Benjamin, had started to go off traveling with Tristam on and off when he was little.

"They're Mega Grenades." Kairi explained. "Sora's dad's friend, Tristam, gave a few to him late last night. Sora said his mom nearly freaked out when she found out he had them."

To put it simply, Benjamin, liked telling bad jokes. Who knows why, but he did. Despite the strange habit he knew when it was time to buckle down and get serious. That is, if Tristam didn't show up and say "Let's go traveling!" Benjamin had extremely wild dark brown hair. It was combed and curved dramatically up to the right. Sora's dad had the type of eyes that could read anyone. The first reading was usually wrong, according to his mom, but he eventually got it right.

His dark chocolate eyes also had a fierce glare too. Sora occasionally joked that he had decided to go traveling to find other worlds 'cause he was fleeing from the glare he had to face when he got into trouble. He did have to completely ignore the fact that his dad's glares were few and far between in order for the joke to make sense, though. Benjamin was an adventure seeking, treasure hunting man. "Tristam converted him." Phoebe had said one day while shooting arrows out towards the ocean. Sora certainly wasn't mad at his dad for running off so much; he, Riku and Kairi had planned for a long time to go search for other worlds. He was mad that Kairi told him Benjamin "had the gall" to do one of his rare return sessions while he was out trying to figure out who Roxas was. And then he had the nerve to leave again right when he got back. That had made Sora mad enough to wish he wasn't a keyblade master a few times.

"Whoa!" Sora called to himself quickly catching and throwing up an already lit bomb he nearly fumbled and let fall to the ground. Sora sighed in relief. 'I think that's enough explosions for tonight.' Sora glided off the roof holding a small orange bag of bombs. Tristam had told him the bombs were enchanted to be smaller than normal and that with a touch of magic he could restore them to their normal size. He had wondered about how Tristam knew that he used magic for a few seconds before Tristam distracted him with a display of an exploding bomb. Tristam had then run off when his mom chased him with a frying pan scolding him.

The neighbors sighed in relief as well and went back into their houses. A few of them yelled at Sora for attempting to do something so stupid and succeeding at it. Sora only smiled and apologized sheepishly in reply.

He ran over to Kairi and Wakka with a smile on his face. "These things are crazy! Imagine what they'd do to heartless or anyone else who got in my way!"

"Imagine the destruction they'd cause if you weren't throwing them up in the air at the height you were." Kairi countered.

Sora frowned, "You're always ruining my fun. I could actually feel the backlash from the explosions, you know."

"Just don't blow your hand off, k?" Kairi hugged her knees close to her chest.

"Stop being such a worrywart Kairi. I know you enjoyed the show." Sora folded his arms

"She's just worried about Riku and what that guy said, ya?" Wakka replied.

"Tidus and Selphie went to go check up on Riku, Kairi. Besides, his mom did say he was sleeping."

"Sora...she was shining a Giant Axe!" Kairi exclaimed. "Why the heck does she need an Axe!?"

Wakka stared at Kairi before busting out in laughter, "Girl, if she wanted to lop off Riku's head she would have done it a long time ago. That thing looks oollllddd, ya? And look," Wakka turned around, "there's Tidus and Selphie now."

Kairi jumped up with a worried shout, "How's Riku?"

"He's still out like a light." Tidus laughed, "Maybe he got scared at what that guy said and decided to sleep until the danger went away." He joked.

"Riku's anything but a wimp Tidus. Let's go on an adventure and see how you do." Kairi folded her arms.

Tidus waved his hands in defense, "Geeze, girls can't take jokes anymore these days." Kairi and Selphie growled. Wakka jumped in front of him before Selphie had a chance to whack him with her jump rope.

"What he means is that he's probably tired of the adventure and stuff, ya? Or maybe he's resting up so he can take on whatever comes his way, ya?"

"Maybe." Sora wondered, "But I'm the one who sleeps like that. Not Riku. It is a bit unnerving."

"You wanna know what's really unnerving?" Tidus commented leaning in towards Sora, Kairi and Wakka with a grin, "I had another-"

"No more dreams Tidus!" The others yelled. Selphie swore if she heard about a Jenova and her psycho pseudo son Sephiroth one more time she was going to kill something.

"Not even one?" Tidus whined.

"Go two movies and three boxes of extra cheese pizza without mentioning Midgar, Nibelheim or Shinra and you can tell your dream. Sora's paying and everyone but you and Sora gets to help choose the movies." Sora blinked opened his mouth to speak a few times. All that came out were a few words of gibberish. Kairi wound up pushing his chin up to make him shut up.

The group of friends piled into Sora's house, leaving Sora behind to recompose himself. "Hey! How do you even know if I have that kind of munny?" Sora shouted after the others.

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~

"You guys are something else." Wakka shook his head leaning into the back of the couch. He glanced over to Tidus sleeping, leaning on his shoulder preventing him from getting any more comfortable in his seat.

"Don't play all innocent." Selphie chastised. "You know you were tired of hearing about the dreams too."

"But did you have to make him think we were going to watch Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire straight through, at this time of night?" Selphie giggled. Tidus had fallen asleep two hours into the movie. They watched another half hour to make sure he was sound asleep. Now she was switching the movie to I, Robot.

"It'll give Tidus a chance to get some more rest. You can't possibly be sleeping well if you're dreaming about that Sephiroth guy." Sora said trying to play it off as though he never had a run in with the man. When Tidus first mentioned Sephiroth, Sora thought that he had heard wrong. Sure enough, in the backlash of flashback dream that accompanied and threw anyone who Tidus was directly telling his dream into a state of confusion, there was Sephiroth killing Aerith and Sephiroth fighting Cloud and Sephiroth blabbering about using his and Cloud's world as a vessel.

Through Tidus' dreams, the group had found out that the man who warned them to protect Riku was Yazoo. They learned about his other two brothers, Kadaj and Loz. The whole nine yards. Hell, they even learned Cloud's story. Sora swore he'd never look at the man and his allies the same way again.

'You'd have to be crazy to not have any fear of Sephiroth.' Sora thought returning to his seat.

"A simple, 'Tidus get some rest and when you wake you can blab about your dreams all you want' wouldn't have taken as long as this did." Kairi commented. She was sitting squished between the left end of the couch and Sora.

"That would have never got him to shut up about them for at least a little while." Selphie replied. "I love stories, but when hearing them causes you to see the same scenes that were in the story, I'd rather not deal with them."

Sora had to keep himself from laughing. The most ironic part about this was that he was the only one who knew with clear certainty that the ones in Tidus' dreams were real, that those dreams spoke truth and had actually occurred and that some of those from the dreams were still alive and kicking.

Sure they all had seen Yazoo, but Sora had run into Sephiroth, Cloud, Tifa, Yuffie, even Cid. He knew them all. They were his friends. He had fought with them, allied with them. Helped rebuild Radiant Guardian with them. He knew for a fact, that they weren't just characters from a dream.

A handful of buttery popcorn goodness smacked into Sora's temple. "Oh! I can't believe I nearly forgot." Selphie said excitedly. Sora wondered how she managed to throw a handful of popcorn over Wakka and Tidus without angering Wakka or waking up Tidus.

"What?" Sora picked up a piece of popcorn that landed on his lap. Kairi's head was bowed slightly, her breathing delicate and even.

"Your dad was at Riku's house."

Sora looked over to Selphie suddenly uninterested in the movie. "Are you sure it was him?"

"He said," Selphie cleared her throat "'tell Sora to make sure he's in bed by his bedtime or he's going to get a time out.' Then your mom said 'he's sixteen Ben.' He then said, 'Age is but a number. Sora still acts like a child.'" Selphie grinned.

'How would he know? He wasn't even here to see me when I got back home.' Sora frowned, "Who else was there?"

"Riku's mom, obviously," Selphie giggled, "and another lady named Rydia. They were having some weird discussion about Riku." The mention of Riku got Wakka's attention as well. He shifted his arm and pushed Tidus off his shoulder. Tidus flopped onto Selphie's. "Uh uh Wakka, he looks way cuter on your shoulder." Selphie grinned pushing Tidus back over. "Besides, he's heavy."

Wakka groaned and looked back at the screen his cheeks flushed.

"About Riku?" Sora said sternly.

"Oh! Right. Sorry." Selphie smiled apologetically. She then looked down at her lap. "I didn't hear exactly what they said, but it sounded like they were talking about a man named Vincent. Then it sounded like Riku's mom said 'He'll be safe then.'" Selphie looked up at Sora, "Something's going on here. I don't think it's a good thing either."

"You guys can go check up on Riku again if ya want." Wakka finally said, "I can hold down the fort here. I know you're all worried about Riku."

"You're not?" Sora asked.

Wakka shook his head, "After what you, Kairi and Riku have been through. I know you guy's can hold your own just fine, especially Riku. I'll be there if he needs me though, guaranteed." Wakka looked down at Tidus, "I'm more worried about Tidus. You know his tendency to laugh through the pain. Anyone dreaming about a guy with a six foot sword stabbing an innocent woman can't be all right." Oddly enough, Sora and Selphie realized that Wakka was right.

After a few moments of silence save for Will Smith trying not to be killed by robots, Sora laughed lightly, "Where'd that bout of intelligence come from Mr. Blitzballer?" Selphie giggled.

"You're not the only one who's changed over these few years, ya?" He replied downing a handful of popcorn.

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~~

**WARNING: GORE!!!**

**Seriously, this next section is goriffic. I nearly threw up and cried while writing this. If scary, bloody Sci-Fi/Fantasy/Horror Movie things scare you, don't hold me responsible if you read this next part and can't sleep for the next three months. (extreme exaggeration, but you get my point) It's a relatively short scene, I cut a lot out, but it's chock full of detail. Scroll down if you don't wanna read. I'll let you know when to come back. **

_Riku damn nearly fainted. He was still half-asleep, so he might as well have been. But his mother, lying there, on the cold cement, her head down to her waist directly in front of him. Her buff colored hair sprawled out around her like a blanket. Eyes dull, and lifeless. A Giant Axe covered in blood lying a few inches from her left hand. The letters J, E, N written out on her torso. A trail of blood and organs sprawled haphazardly on the street directing Riku's eyes to her lower body a few feet in front of her upper body. The letters O, V, A carved deep into her legs. That. Woke Riku up. _

_And if that hadn't woke him up, when he noticed the two beings on his right, he would have woken up. "Mr. Kurosaki..." Riku whispered softly. Benjamin was huddled over his wife, his blue tank top soaked in his blood. Some sort of metal coil embedded deep inside his back, just barely missing his spine. He could not see Phoebe completely, but he knew she was out cold at least. Her blond hair was matted down, dyed a sickening light red-orange color. A broken wooden bow, a sprawled out pack of arrows and a longsword with a golden hilt shaped in a "Times New Roman" type 'T' fashion with a red gem in the center of the hilt, lied around the two in a semi circle._

_A few feet in front of his to his left, a man dressed in black leather wearing a long red cloak. A few feet directly in front of him, kneeling in a pool of blood next to his mother's top half, staring down at Kaeli, a woman wearing a relatively skimpy yet elegant green outfit soaked in blood. Tears flowed freely down her face. She seemed to be chanting something. And a few feet in front of him to his right, the thing Riku could only assume killed his mother and had no mercy on his best friends parents. _

_It held a wide broadsword in one hand with ease. The tip of the blade was slightly raised off the ground. The broadsword was fading away however, along with the features of a woman dressed in black with short spiky white hair. It's skin was a deep gray. It's hair was frighteningly straight, long and silver. Red and silver coils stuck out of it's upper torso, wrapping about it. Some of the coils had been sliced, and were on the ground surrounding it's feet. The handle of a weapon identical to the Axe next to his mother was deep in it's left side. The weapon had gone right through it's arm and into it's torso. The blade was not visible. _

_It turned to look at Riku. It's head was littered with holes. A 3 barreled gun in the red cloak wearing man's hand was still smoking. Riku could see straight into it's head through it's eye sockets. A plethora of dark and lime green blood coated it's body. Riku could see it's brain through the holes, the muscles of it's body. _

_'It.' Riku thought swallowing thickly. It looked female, but it was nothing of the sort. No female, no human, could do what it had done here. Heartless. Insane. Drive and lust for death and murder. The area was silent. Bathed in death, despair and blood. Bathed in Jenova._

_It charged at him. As incapacitated as it seemed it should be, it charged at him. Jenova charged at him, deftly yanking out the weapon in it's side. An axe like his mothers. _

_Riku stood frozen. Nausea washing over him, tears pouring down his face in rivers, and a scream tearing at his throat full of terror. The abilities he learned while traveling were forgotten. _

_Out the corner of his eye, Riku saw a light blond haired boy. His hair was ruffled, yet tame. His eyes as blue as Sora's. The boy would have been there, if he wasn't translucent. _

_Riku backed up into his house two or three steps when a bullet pierced through Jenova's head, zoomed towards Riku's house at a diagonal and embedded itself in the wall. The man leaped over the puddle of green and gray goop, picked up Riku and leaped back. He landed next to the girl in green. _

_She looked up at Riku and the man and sighed standing with a shudder and a sniffle. The trio backed up away from the remains. "I wish I was more useful."_

_"It was smart of it to destroy the Eidolons before anyone got a chance to use them against it once more." The man replied. "You know what happens when a Eidolon that's been summon is killed. You're lucky Rydia."_

_"Lucky enough to be killed by this psychopath, Vincent. It's regenerating again."_

_Riku guessed it was a safety mechanism, but he refused to focus on anything in front of him. 'If I don't see it, it's not there. I'm probably still sleeping anyway.' He tried to rationalize between his sobs and shaking and shuddering. His mother was not butchered in front of him. Neither were Mr. and Mrs. Kurosaki. And he was not looking at a ghost of a boy screaming something or other at him. No sound was coming from him. Nope, he certainly wasn't. _

_Riku sniffed and wiped his eyes. He finally calmed down enough for Way to Dawn to subconsciously appear in his hand. "....Tidus?" He questioned softly looking at the ghost kid. _

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~~_  
_

_**The squeamish can start reading again. **_

Tidus jumped up with a start. He looked around shakily. "Where the heck am I?" He whispered.

"Sora's house, in the living room, squeezing my arm way too tightly, ya?" Wakka replied. Tidus looked down. His hands were gripped tight on Wakka's right bicep.

"Sorry..."

"Ya also hit me a few times, but I'll let that slide." Tidus let go and resumed to leaning on Wakka's shoulder.

"Yea..." Tidus breathed heavily.

"Tidus?" Wakka looked down at him. He was covered in a cold sweat. He looked as though he saw something awful. "Another dream?" Tidus nodded.

"I don't want to talk talk about it." Wakka nodded in understanding. Inside he was worried. Tidus never had a dream he didn't want to talk about. Tidus spewing his dreams to everyone was no different from Selphie telling her fairytale romances.

Speaking of Selphie, she was in the kitchen by the stove. She, Sora and Kairi were making some breakfast. It was mainly to preoccupy Sora. Eleven AM and his parents hadn't come home yet. Sora was getting worried.

Selphie glanced back at Tidus and Wakka and smiled. 'Aww...' She mentally cooed. Sora was on the phone with who knew who. Kairi was making toast.

Tidus jumped up with another start. "Wakka..."

"Ya?"

Tidus looked around fumbling for the TV remote. "Riku's mom is dead." He said sadly, shaking.

Wakka stared at him like he was insane. "What are you talking about?"

"Ms. Kurosaki's in a light coma. Mr. Kurosaki is dying."

In the kitchen, Sora dropped the phone. It fell to the floor with an echoing thud. Through the receiver Kairi heard the calm voice of a man.

_"Hello? Are you there Sora?"_

"And Riku's been kidnapped." Tidus continued.

Sora fell to his knees, desperately trying to make sense of what the paramedic just told him.

"Selphie, get the phone." Kairi said sternly kneeling next to Sora. Selphie quickly turned off the stove and tried to figure out what the heck whoever Sora was talking to said to make him break down like he currently was.

Suddenly Sora pushed Kairi out the way and ran out the front door. Kairi quickly followed.

"Sorry! Gotta go!" Selphie yelled into the phone. She then hung up and ran after the duo. Tidus finally found the remote and turned the television on to the news. He left Wakka confused sitting on the couch, the right half of him covered in Tidus' sweat and tears, watching the news.

_"Continuing with today's Breaking News. Early this morning, Ms. Hitsugaya was found brutally murdered and torn apart in the middle of the road in front of the Hitsugaya household. Along with Ms. Hitsugaya's remains were the disheveled and beaten bodies of Mr. and Ms. Kurosaki. Both are in Unstable Critical and Critical yet stable condition respectively. Ms. Hitsugaya's son, 17 year old Riku Hitsugaya, was no where to found at the scene when Paramedics arrived."_

"What the hell!?" Wakka yelled over the T.V. standing up. He didn't wait to hear anything else before rushing out after the others.

* * *

**Notes:**

Lol, I didn't realize I typed that many notes.

6 pages of story that made me go, "Woman, wth are you writing?" :XD  
Sorry for the delay in release. I got caught up in the Holidays. I've got a bit of a block for this story, trying to figure out how to fit FFVI in. But you guys are good and I'm safe for two more weeks if there's no delay in releases. Next chapter is longer, guaranteed.

My chapters start getting more action/gore in them from here on in relatively. I will warn you whenever we come up to such a scene. Once again, if you're sick of reading my hints and notes, just knock me upside the head with a review.

"Crazy Kaeli's" axe is an actual weapon in the Mystic Quest game. Both Benjamin (the default name of the Mystic Quest character you play as at least in the English Version) and Kaeli use this axe towards the end of the game. Don't "axe" (lol) me how she or Benjamin managed to keep it all this time in good usuable condition.

This chapter jumps a lot to me. Does it for you readers out there? It seems to shift crazily. Aww, I never was good with transition.

"She was a strong woman, a bit ditsy...", she comes off as that for me. As stated in the FF wikia page underneath her bio, she's the one who gives Ben the Jumbo Bombs, but winds up ruining her uncle's work on the underground cave he was making to get to Spencer using one of them. That was pretty funny though. She's all like, "Um...we better get out of here!" XD If you've never played or heard of FF Mystic Quest, you can search gameplay vids on Youtube. All the ones I've managed to find are speedruns though.

All weapons mentioned in this story are actual weapons in any Final Fantasy related game. They're not all found in every game, but they're found in at least one.

Character descriptions are based on the ones in the FF Wikia character bio pages.

Benjamin travels for two main reasons. He ends the Mystic Quest game taking Spencer's ship and sailing round the world and I highly doubt that Riku just wanting to go to different worlds would have influenced him. Sora does have that hard head of his.

"...Let's go on an adventure and see how you do." - Goodness I love foreshadowing. Although it's only fun to know when you already know what's gonna happen.

Most of my info dealing with anything Tidus or Wakka related comes straight from my head, which got there through fanfiction. It's probably not accurate as I only skimmed the FFX pages on the FF wikia page after writing this chapter, I think.

If you've not figured out what it spells on Kaeli's body in the Gore scene, you can ask me, but do note I'm only taking one excuse for that: You didn't read the gore scene. I'm not a fan of FFVII mainly because of the crappy PSX quality, but even I got sick of hearing about FFVII enough to figure out what the hell people were talking about.

I don't care what anyone says, Riku is not superman. He would not sit and stare at that scene of gore, and recoil from the shock quick enough to bust out Way to the Dawn and do some Jenova busting. He _is_ stronger than Sora though. I imagine Sora would do that stupid, horror movie thing people do. The whole, "run upstairs to the attic, where you're then stuck and completely fucked" thing. All in all, I think their difference in strength/courage comes from their ability to stay and stare true evil in the face. I don't think Sora has that strength. The closest thing to evil Sora's run into in my book is Hades, just 'cause he's the God of Hell or something like that. But when someone possesses you and tries to control your body to the extent that Ansem did with Riku, I think that's evil. Well, as close to evil as you can get in this game. Nothing or anyone really dies in the KH series. They all just fall in defeat and/or fade away.

On the other hand, if cannon Sora was aware of cannon FFVII Sephiroth's story and his wants etc etc, meaning KH Sephiroth didn't exist, and reacted in-game to this, then I think my theory on their strengths would have to be thrown out the window. Come on now, let's not front. We're all aware that Sephiroth is the strongest and most evil villian in the FF Series, right? I'm talking stastically. I do believe in the FF Wiki, it does say the creator of the FF Series believes this.

Eidolon = Guardian Force, Summon, etc etc. In my book, Bahamut and the others are the same damn thing. Do not care where they came from. Eidolon is the FFIX name for them and the best in my opinion.  
"You know what happens when a Eidolon that's been summon is killed. You're lucky Rydia." - That concept only appears in FFIV, when Rydia's mother is killed when someone or other takes out her summon.

"...Tidus spewing his dreams to everyone was no different from Selphie telling her fairytale romances..." I don't know if Selphie does that for real, I read that in a fanfiction I believe.

Why yes, didja see that? They do have the last names of characters from Bleach. Funniest part of about it is I don't even like Bleach enough to give it much attention, ie, watching it religiously.

**Thanks so much for reading, leaving a review and/or just taking a look at my story everyone! ^^**


	4. Chapter 4

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** October 09, 2008 252AM (I'm assuming AM. This chapter went on a bit of a hiatus. Knew where I wanted it to go, just couldn't write it out.) to Monday, December 8, 2008 425PM. Lawl, I started this on my birthday. O.o

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

* * *

"What the hell do you mean they're not back yet!?" Leon covered his eyes with an arm, yawning. "Just how long fuckin' long does it take to warp here from Radiant Garden!?" Cid was angry. Again. Being tired and angry just didn't go together. Leon slowly sat up on the couch he was sitting on.

"How the heck am I supposed to know?! I don't make a habit of driving gummy ships!"

Leon took the opportunity to stride past Cid and Tifa. Everything went to hell when Aerith passed out in some sort of coma. Scratch that. Everything went to hell when Firion, Edge, Rydia, Benjamin, Cecil and Vincent appeared one by one in Radiant Garden a little while back.

The name Jenova rung a lot of bells and brought back memories he didn't even want to think about. Things way worse than his failure to protect Radiant Garden from Maleficent and the heartless. The thing was fast and powerful. Way more powerful than he or Rinoa could ever be. "All shot to hell." Leon muttered walking through the halls, shaking his head.

Could he even have called that hell? Somehow, he thought hell wouldn't be that bad. It was more like the Apocalypse on steroids after drinking a few martinis of life stream and darkness. The whole thing had started simple. Nothing out of the ordinary from the strange girl dressed in pink with a ribbon in her hair appearing. Until she had run into Fuujin.

Things had gotten weird then. Fuujin counted many times when the girl stalked her. It was almost constant. This girl just following her, studying her. Like she was part of some sick science experiment.

_"Ahhhh, won't you join me for my reunion?"_ Leon remembered hearing Seifer repeat her words clearly one day a few weeks after the strange girl had showed up. Seifer had gone on to explain that Fuujin had then fallen into some kind of trance, and started throwing her chakram around with strength he had never seen. The force of the throw had cleanly sliced off Raijin's arm and left Seifer with a gash in him he'd never forget receiving in the first place. Leon would have continued thinking that Seifer had gone crazy, but Seifer already looked the part and he never knew Raijin had screams like that within him.

Within hours it went from being a bright sunny day to a day with enough bloodshed to last a lifetime. Leon remembered so clearly. The main force of terror had started off with it placing a seal upon Rinoa, preventing her from using any Sorceress powers. It was nothing but chaos from there. Long range attacks had no effect. Whatever the hell it was that was attacking them had quickly shown that. One second it had dodged Irvine's gunshots, caught up to him and snapped his neck with ease and the next it was jamming Seifer's gunblade into Selphie's stomach while it took a few perfect shots with Irvine's gun to Zell's head. And then with a smile Jenova, in the form of who he came to know as Aerith, was on the other side of the field, sending some kind of metal coil into Fuujin's back, right up along the spine.

In his close to unconscious gaze, he remembered seeing the spirit of Cloud's friend. He was looking down at Selphie, who was still alive despite being pinned to the ground with a gunblade through her torso. And Leon knew, he damn well cheated death when he heard Cloud's friend say, "Come with me," just as he passed out. He didn't know who else had managed to cheat death and while he did care to know, he didn't want to put the others in a situation where cheating death was the only option just to find them.

Leon passed a small room on his way out of the Restoration Committee's HQ. He backtracked and looked over at Aerith through the doorway. She was lying on her bed, covered with a beautiful red comforter. Her arms folded over her sheets and her chest, a few wisps of green rising up from her body from time to time. He smiled sadly remembering the first time he saw Aerith. Since that day he had to work his ass off just to get Cloud to talk to him. He was 14, again, at the time and had just settled into Radiant Garden's orphanage. He had lunged at her with his pocketknife going on about revenge. He had cut her good too.

After Cloud had finished beating the snot out of him, Leon'd come to realize the difference between Aerith and this Jenova. Slowly, with time, he soon knew what Cloud and the others knew about it. Aerith was the one who told him that he saw the spirit of Zack Fair on that fateful day. If there was one thing he'd never want to run into again, Jenova would have to be that thing.

He didn't blame Fuujin at all for the whole mess. There were tons of reasons why he could have blamed her. All of them fell through in the end. In truth, he pitied her. Completely and truly.

_"Fuujin. Zack told me about her. I'm not sure how it happened, but she is a descendant of someone who had Jenova's cells running through their veins. I do have a theory though. Summons and Guardian forces despite having different names are the same thing essentially. There are signs that these special summons use the world's own energy to survive and be summoned. No different from a human. They exist in most worlds that have come across Jenova's being."_

_"Are you saying the summons may be "cross contaminating" the planet's energy with this Jenova's energy? Since it's obvious they can travel from planet to planet."_

_"It's just a theory, but it works for the most part in explaining how people from other worlds wound up with Jenova's cells in them. Jenova is a being of regeneration. It essentially infects people with it's cells and uses them to help it conquer and destroy the world by draining it's life force. If those who are infected are killed, the energy of that person enters the lifestream of the planet, but is unable to merge with it and rest. If they can be killed that is." _

It had taken Leon some time to understand, but eventually he got it. He wondered how many people out there were like Fuujin. Those who could never truly die and rest because they were infected by a supernatural entity. He certainly couldn't blame Fuujin. She had no control over what genes she received. And she was already suffering enough without someone adding on to the whole ordeal.

The only good thing he could think of from knowing this about Fuujin was that he definitely knew she was alive somewhere out there. Where, on the other hand... He'd leave that question alone. If he could find her chances were Jenova could too and probably found her before him. And no one in their right mind needed Fuujin to go on another Jenova possessed death related killing spree.

"The number isn't that large." Leon came out of his thoughts. He didn't think he had said that out loud. Cloud was sitting quietly next to Aerith's bed. His sword was leaning against the wall behind him. "Most who become infected with Jenova wind up dying or merging back with it. If they die from the infection, Jenova comes along and takes back its cells."

Cloud stood grabbing his sword.

"Leaving again?"

"Not much of a choice." Cloud replied. "Fuujin? Friend of yours?"

"Acquaintance is more like it." Leon replied warily.

"Benjamin Kurosaki found Raijin and Seifer in the world Twilight Town. They reported a few days before Benjamin got there that Fuujin had been kidnapped."

Leon stared at Cloud absorbing his words. Not only Fuujin was alive, but so were Raijin and Seifer. It was a relief to him, despite the troubles the trio had given to him. Especially when the way they were attacked and killed had come into play.

Fuujin being kidnapped only helped to increase his worries and fears. It was up to something again. How many more people would get the "luxury ability" to cheat death before it was defeated? Scratch that. Could it even be defeated?

Cloud was in a hurry Leon guessed. The older male didn't give him any chances to ask any questions. He did manage to catch one unusual feature about him though.

Leon took one last look at Aerith. He hoped whatever the kind woman was doing, she was at peace doing it. He then turned around and walked off, "What the heck is up with his eyes? How the hell did I miss that before?"

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~~

"See anything!"

"I kinda don't want to!" Yuffie called down from on top of a house in Radiant Garden's residential area.

"Understandable." Luneth mumbled to himself, moving his light gray hair out of his eyes. Both had way too many vivid images of it taking out all that they had loved and known within hours of gory despair. Luneth looked around the area with deep blue violet eyes, focused on finding any sign of anything else that wasn't normal. The heels of his tall black boots clicked against the concrete ground loudly along the sounds of the few children and teens that had been allowed and the equally few adults who risked going outside today.

Word of something like _that_ managing to get not only close to the Restoration HQ, but to the Castle itself was unnerving. Luneth rolled up the sleeves of his dark blue violet sweatshirt. Many stories were heard and generated of how it managed to tackle and destroy a mischievous fairy, part of a trio of females who enjoyed going "treasure hunting" all around the Garden. Few had seen the way it took apart Paine, even in her human form, like she was nothing. Few had seen the way it grabbed Yuna by her rat-tail and swung her around eventually throwing her into a torrent of electrical equipment.

Luneth glanced down at his left shoulder. Yuna sat, the bare parts of her skin, save her face, covered in bandages. She moved stiffly; it nothing less than hurt to move, but she was determined help any way that she could.

**Warning: **Slight graphic imagery.

Most definitely few had seen it's heartless actions. Luneth had been there. It had picked up one of Yuna's handguns and aimed it at Luneth. Point blank range to the forehead. Luneth had been prepared to take what fate had offered him. He lived far too long, second only to Firion. He had never expected Rikku, the third fairy, in her human form to tackle the entity and get into a brawl with it. He failed to protect her. It was her and Luneth against Jenova. Within minutes it had come down to nothing but luck. It had not only shot Rikku in the head, but then kicked her head clean off of her body. Her skull had hit the wall; it was cracked, pieces of skull embedded into her brain. Luneth was glad the doctors had said that the bullet alone killed her...

**Done. **

Luneth had been saved by luck. Complete and total luck. It had seized up, just as it was about to kill him. Luneth rubbed his sweaty palms against his tight fitting gray pants. After seizing up, it had run off, leaving Cloud and the others to find him a blubbering mess of a man.

He wasn't out here by force. Even Cid had suggested, practically demanded, that Luneth heal and rest. He was here because he knew it'd be back. And he wanted to help as much as he could before then. Even he knew that when it returned, no matter what, his time was up.

Yuffie landed next to Luneth. Placed a hand on his shoulder. Luneth, Cloud and especially Aerith. Keep someone with them at all times. Cid had said it so many times, if someone had noticed that their current "guardian" had been inconveniently lost, they'd pick up the job for them. There were so many unspoken rules and plans that they all followed that it was scary. Yuna rubbed a tiny hand on Luneth's shoulder. The action made her cringe, but she ignored the pain.

"What do we do if we run into her-it?" Yuffie questioned. Luneth gave her this 'don't look at me; you already know the answer,' look. "I don't wanna die..." She whined. Luneth smiled sadly. That was understandable, she was what, at least 1500 years younger than him? Problem was Jenova doesn't discriminate.

~~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~~~

Tifa wanted to bang her head against something. The Great Maw? Was Cloud serious? He wanted to hang out in the Great Maw, despite all threats of that...thing running around. This wasn't exactly the idea that came to her head when Cid had said they were keeping an eye out for Cecil and Edge. She looked around, the area was as quiet...and blue as it always was. The sky stuck in those bleary shades of purple and red-violet. It certainly beat the normally black skies around Midgar, and even the gray skies of Edge, nonetheless.

She looked over to Cloud. He was sitting staring up at the sky, an arm resting on a raised knee. Dare she say this was his version of meditating? She almost didn't want to disrupt him. It was common knowledge between the entire group that Jenova and Sephiroth practically ran hand in hand. And anything involving Sephiroth without a doubt would eventually involve Cloud.

She was so into her thoughts that she barely heard Cloud whisper-

"What the hell...?" She watched Cloud stand, staring up into the sky more intently. Tifa decided to join him and looked up as well. A large blue mass, it looked small but that was only because it was relatively far away, seemed to be falling down at an angle. Cloud pressed a hand to his ear, "Cid, you got visual on me and Tifa?"

"Yeah yeah, what?" A gruff voice replied through Cloud's headset.

"What is that?" The falling object looked a bit larger now. Small to medium sized chunks occasionally broke off of the object.

"...Don't just stand there!" Cid yelled particularly loudly. "RUN!" Cloud picked up his buster sword, grabbed Tifa's wrist and the two of them started to run back towards the castle.

Tifa was still looking back towards the object. It kicked up clouds of blue rocky smoke as it landed and tumbled, right towards them. Tifa decided to just focus on what was ahead of her so she or Cloud wouldn't be crushed by whatever it was that had fallen out of the sky. "Cloud!" She called out.

Cloud busted out some of his soldier training, hurling his sword out in front of him. He picked up Tifa bridal style, and performed one hell of a leaping jump, just as the dark blue object bounced relatively high for it's size and weight. The gusts from the object flying a few feet through the air and falling once more caused Cloud to lose his balance on the whole act. Tifa looked back trying to make out what it was that landed through the dust and smoke.

Cloud lost his grip on her just as she and him hit the ground skidding. The object skidded as well, kicking up even more smoke and blue dust. Everything skid to a stop just a few seconds later, the object teetering on one edge. Cloud look up, only having a few seconds to move before the object fell and crushed him. He jumped out from underneath the object just as it fell, the gusts from the object tumbling once more blowing Cloud back again.

He flipped and landed in a crouch, just a few feet in front of Tifa. Between them, his buster sword landed, it's sharp point piercing the hard rock like a hot knife through butter.

"-oud! -oud!" Cloud just barely heard Cid yelling at him through the receiver hooked around his ear. Tifa heard the same static covered yelling through her own receiver. "-ost visual! -breaking up!"

"Cloud!" Tifa called out to him through the clearing smoke. Aside from a few scratches on her torso and legs from where the wind had blown her out of Cloud's grasp and she had gone flying through the air and then skidding on the ground, she was alright. Shaken, but alright.

One thing was going through Cloud's head, 'That was no accident.' He stood, ignoring the dust covering his clothing and walked backwards slowly, towards his sword. Cid wouldn't be able to get anything through this dust.

Tifa hoisted herself to her knees and then to a standing position. From what she could tell, large blocks surrounded the blue object. She made her way towards Cloud, careful to not startle him. "What is that?"

"Gummy ship." Cloud replied coughing a bit. He'd take being surrounded by Cid's cigarette smoke over this debris any day. He stared ahead of him, sword ready to slice whoever came out of that gummy ship. No way they were going to get away with threatening their lives as they did. Even if it was an accident.

Tifa looked back and around. She didn't realize that thing had forced them so close to the Crystal Fissure. A bit closer and it wouldn't have mattered if they had run. The Fissure would have collapsed, crushing them. She too, finally decided that either this was an extreme malfunction on the part of that gummy ship, or this wasn't an accident at all.

She was more prompted to believe that this had been an extreme malfunction though. "Cloud, that's-" Cloud cut her off as she moved towards the ship. The dust and smoke were clearing even more. Tifa looked at Cloud. She guessed he had seen something she hadn't.

"That thing just fell out of the sky. Like someone just shut off the engines after calculating what direction and speed they'd have to be going in order to get it to land on us. We'd be dead if I hadn't seen it and Cid hadn't told us to run."

"Cloud...no one hates us that much." Tifa decided Cloud was suffering from a mild to severe case of paranoia. Since he came back from fighting Sephiroth, he's been acting off. Of course, acting off meant a number of things concerning Cloud and he hadn't acted like his true self for a long time, but that was besides the point.

"Not you. Me." Cloud replied.

"I highly doubt Edge and Cecil would try to..." Tifa cut herself off. 'Well, duh Tifa!' She mentally yelled at herself. The gummy ship's sliding silver door, broke up into two large pieces. The pieces fell to the ground forward, in front of the ship. Tifa immediately pulled on her gloves and Cloud heaved up his sword prepared to strike.

**Warning:** Slightly vivid imagery.

Standing amidst the thinning smoke. In the doorway of the gummy ship, slowly walking towards them, a silhouette. The left side of the being's head was covered in long, shoulder length strands of hair, reminiscent of Cecil. The right side covered with short spiky, gray strands, reminiscent of Edge. One eye was a deep green, the other dark gray; both eyes had cat like pupils. It's lips were curled into a sinister smirk, as it walked towards them, the skin tight leather outfit it wore moving with it like a second skin. The handle of the longsword, Lightbringer, burned and sizzled in it's right hand. The skin of it's hand once that pale skin tone, now bubbling and burning turning from a sickish gray to a deep black. The cuts in it's hand oozed neon green.

**Done.**

"Cloud..." That oh so familiar deep velvet voice called out. The name rolled off the tongue so easily. It took a few more steps. The duo noticed the thick wires and cables wrapped round it's arms and torso. It walked towards them in a drunken haze. It's head titled back as it looked up at the sky, a baritone laugh rippling deep through it's throat and escaping the lips of a freakish entity. "Cloud..."

It's hair grew longer, slowly, changing to deep silver hair, it's eyes changed to that familiar mako green. It bowed it's head, and looked up at Cloud and Tifa with it's eyes. "Cloud..." The sword flickered, continuously changing from Lightbringer to Masamune.

Cloud grabbed Tifa and pushed her back just as it disappeared. It reappeared in front of Cloud, so close that he could feel the breath and energy of mako and pure evil washing over him. Cloud couldn't believe that he himself, after coming into contact with this thing twice already, fuckin' froze...again. The fourth time apparently, was not the charm. It rested it's forehead against Clouds. "Soon..." It whispered. Cloud closed his eyes, wanting to block it out. "So very soon..."

Tifa for all intents and purposes was useless. This was the first time seeing it again, and she had no idea what to expect. Whatever she was expecting, it certainly wasn't what she was seeing. How she wasn't dead yet, she had no clue.

It disappeared in a burst of neon green, black feathers and energy which threw Cloud to the ground on his ass. Cloud stood with a start shaking his head.

"Cloud!" Tifa called out running up to him. Cloud turned and pushed past her, running as fast as his legs could take him. "Cloud!" Tifa called out again following. Why was she turning so useless now?

"Cid!" Cloud called through his radio.

"What the hell was I listenin-!?"

"There's no time! Who's with Luneth!?" Cloud yelled.

"Was that Edge, Cecil, Sephiroth or Jenova!?" Tifa yelled keeping up with Cloud nearly perfectly. Cloud glanced her a look.

"Yuna and Yuffie! That was-"

"Not enough! Not enough!" Cloud yelled, "Who's closest to him?!"  
"Slow down dam-"

"He's gonna DIE! Who's closest!?" Cloud yelled more sternly, demanding an answer.

"Leon's in the area. Headed right towards him dammit!" Cid yelled loud and quickly.

"Not enough..." Cloud sighed, still running. "Who else?!"  
"Cloud..." Tifa watched him closely. The man was half way to frantic-ville. Which was perfectly understandable. The first time he froze, it had been Barret, Marlene and Denzel who had paid the price. The second time...now that she thought about, Cloud never mentioned the second time. It went straight to the third time which was when he froze right before it managed to infiltrate the Garden, absorb Paine and kill Rikku so quickly. This was the fourth, technically. Cloud was a very lucky man. A very stupid lucky man.

"No one dang it! We only have so many people who know about this and are able to do anything! And you can quit yo' rushin'!"

Cloud slowed to a stop, standing just outside the residential area, breathing hard. Tifa was right behind him. "Luneth-?"

Tifa stared at Cloud, "What the HELL just happened?" She had a feeling she knew, but she wasn't quite sure. It had happened so fast.

"Gone." Cloud and Tifa heard Leon's voice through his own radio. "Got here a few minutes before you. Just in time to see it cause some real damage." Leon's voice was heavy, dull. He was breathing hard. They heard the clang of his gunblade hitting the ground over the radio. "It picked up Luneth and disappeared in some weird portal."

"Black wisps?" Cloud asked walking ahead. His sword dragged against the ground. Around him, people screamed in terror, even through the people trying to say it was gone. The duo came across decapitated or maimed bodies occasionally. Tifa imagined they were killed so quickly because they had gotten in it's way without even knowing.

"They never knew what hit them..." Tifa sighed.

"That's the stuff." Leon replied. They could hear him shuffling. (AN: Why does that sound like Leon just took a drug of some kind? XD He's not, he's just answering Cloud's question.)

"Shit." Cloud banged the side of his fist against a building. Anyone around him besides Tifa backed up and/or ran off in fear. "Corridors of Darkness... what the hell _can't_ it do?" Eventually Cloud sighed, "What did it look like?"

"I'm still trying to get my visuals back." Cid replied gruffly. "Don'tcha know what it looks like already?"

Tifa looked at Cloud and then quickly around the area, "I think he means who..."

"...Cecil." Leon replied after a few shaky breaths.

"Dammit..."

"Edge." Tifa whispered. "Cecil did say he himself had been infected." The two of them came across the shopping district where Leon had met up with the others. They were just a short way from them now.

**Warning: **VERY graphic imagery. It only gets worse if you've a vivid imagination like myself. If you don't wanna read this part, just remember that Yuffie will be taking a long rest, and Jenova moves damn fast...like don't blink fast...

"Yu...na..." Leon crawled over to Yuffie who was trying to stand. He ignored the pain in his leg and the blood trail he was leaving. It had grabbed him by his leg, and swung him around like a rag doll. He hadn't seen what it had done to Yuffie, wasn't even sure what it did. "She never got a chance to get off his shoul....der..." Suddenly, she fell back to the ground screaming through her own headset.

"Oh GOD!" Leon yelled, "Medic!"

"Just pick her up and bring her back here dangit!" Cid yelled

"Even if I could walk, if I picked her up I'd kill her!" Leon yelled back just as Cloud and Tifa came across them.

"Oh my God." Tifa turned her head, swallowing thickly and covering her eyes with her arm.

"Yuffie!" Cloud dropped his buster sword and ran over to her sliding into a kneeling position.

"What dangit!? What!?"

"Cid...her intestines...Yuffie, don't go to sleep!" Cloud's lower legs and arms were soaked in blood.

"What dammit!? I can't see anything yet!"

"Just get medics over here NOW!" Cloud ordered with anything less than a kind tone. Yuffie looked up at Cloud dazed, a thick long gash ripping through the side of her torso. Her body, cut open just enough for a bit of her intestines to lie on the ground next to her. A jello-resembling mass, her body leaking blood like a water fountain.

Leon could only watch, as he tried to pull himself up on his other leg slowly. "I can't believe...she moves too fast. I didn't even see...I-I-I was there for most of the fight! A blur pushed her down! A fuckin' blur! Nothing, NOTHING moves THAT fast."

"Alright! Alright!" The radio on the other end went quiet.

**Graphic image part is over. So is the chapter. ^^;**

* * *

**Notes:**

Goodness, every time I write in Jenova I find myself swallowing thickly and trying not to regurgitate. Why the hell did I decide to write this? I don't even remember.

I tried to fit in FFVIII as best as I could. Despite the fact I can't stand that game just from what I've read and seen I'm trying to give it equal justice in this story. On that same note, if you wanna see FFVI let me know. I've never heard of FFVI until KHII. O.o I'm gonna need some background information and if you want any GOOD white or silvered haired folk to appear. No characters that were killed/defeated during the plot of the original game please. This is the only time I'm letting the reader help me write this story...hopefully.  
**Edit:** Got it! The only white haired character I've run into, within the main cast is Setzer. That works just fine for me. I know how to include him, and now I just have to figure out how to connect it all together.

Luneth is from the DS version of Final Fantasy Three. I've never played the game, so despite my research he's probably out of character.

Rat-Tail: That long ponytail thing that makes up the length in Yuna's hairstyle. Source I believe is from the Final Fantasy Wiki.  
I got the idea of the KHII Gullwings having human forms from a Fanfiction I read a while ago. I can't remember which one though.

Who killed off Rikku!? *looks around* That was NOT me. One minute I was furiously typing as ideas (FINALLY after 3 months) flowed into my head and the next I was rereading and going "Oh shit, how'd that happen?" Seriously. Rikku was NOT supposed to die. I had the story loosely drawn out in my head and she had quite a few important spots. So if you can figure out how to rewrite that paragraph taking out Rikku's death without it not looking right (like what happens with me), you just let me know. Pleeeeeaaaaaaaase? *whines* (Otherwise she's staying dead.)  
On another note, I'm not sure if it's possible to kick off someone's head like that, but I'm also pretty sure someone like Jenova doesn't exist.

You're probably very confused right now. If you're thinking, "I thought Jenova was chasing Riku and Vincent?" You're right. It still is. It also just took Luneth. There's only one way that would work, considering the two places are on other sides the Kingdom Hearts Universe. No way in hell Corridors of Darkness don't work THAT fast.

And here's an extra **hint:** Cloud's a wuss right now isn't he? He doesn't seem like the type of person who would just stand there.

~~~~~~~~~~~  
I think this chapter's 4-6 pages or so. I don't have the document open right now. Ever knew that if you worked on something furiously, you'd finish it quite quickly and be able to get on with your life, but just don't feel like doing it? That usually happens to folks with school and house work. For me right now, it's my story. Maybe it's because I know that if I start working on it, I'll be doing so for hours upon hours. XD

I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. Thanks so much everyone for at least looking at this story! Remember you can smack me upside the head in a review if you're sick of seeing my notes.


	5. Chapter 5

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** December 12, 2008 1259AM to 547AM

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

* * *

Vincent scowled taking a few seconds to look at the gun Jenova had just sliced in half, leaving him holding the handle and just a bit of the barrel. He snarled before whacking it in the head with Cerberus' remains and jumping back out the way of a clawed hand. He felt a light pressure on his shoulders a few seconds after he landed.

"Dark Aura!" It screeched as Riku flew around it, slashing it with Way to the Dawn. Vincent watched while replacing his lost Cerberus with the five "barreled" Death Penalty. It looked like he wasn't the only one with dormant abilities thought to be no more. As Riku sliced much of it in half horizontally across the stomach and moved to hit it with a paralyzing Dark Lightning move, Vincent focused shots at it's head.

It fell to a crumpled heap of neon green blood and a horrific mass of peeling gray. Riku ran back past Vincent and picked up a bag of his regular attire from behind the remains of a fire damaged building. "What is that thing!?" Riku yelled.

"You're really asking that _now_?" Vincent replied taking a few steps back as it begun to reform.

"Nothing wrong with knowing what's trying to kill me right?" Riku called back breathing heavily. Vincent shot past him grabbing his wrist. Riku swung his bag back on his shoulder.

"It's stronger now. It must have merged with more of it's cells." Vincent muttered, knowing full well Riku could hear him. He pulled Riku ahead of him and looked back to shoot more shots at it's currently mutated form.

Riku continued through the streets of the charred city's remains. Riku knew much of what had happened here despite never once coming across this world nor this town. 'Tidus and his dreams.' He thought. 'That thing doesn't even let up for a second.' Riku looked down at his shorts and t-shirt, 'Not even to let me change out of my nightwear.'

Vincent wasn't pleased. Even with his strongest gun it now took him a round of five bullets to even down the extra terrestrial beast. He wouldn't be any good against it if it kept merging. He failed to dodge a firm kick to the torso. Its speed had increased too.

"Vincent!" Riku yelled forming a Dark Firaga fireball in his hands. Vincent's red cape curled about him protectively as he slid across the ground, kicking up ash and dirt. He tumbled a few times before regaining his footing. "Dark Fire!" Riku yelled hurling a fury of fireballs at it. Vincent couldn't help but think of the irony as it was walked through the flames, screeching in some form of sadistic pleasure as the flames burned, charred and melted it's skin. Vincent shot a round of bullets at it's chest and then another round at it's head for good measure. It got smart however, and used the scratched up helmet on it's head to shield itself from the bullets.

It looked up at Vincent with a scowling smirk of hatred. Riku let his arms drop to his sides. "Hey. Vincent?" Riku said dejectedly. It slowly continued on towards the duo. "I'm out of MP." Vincent scowled, readying Death Penalty as it leaped towards him. Was it so wrong for him to want to yell, "Fuck you HOJO! Fuck YOU!", at that moment?

"Heartless Angel." Riku and Vincent looked around, Riku more confused than Vincent. Vincent saw it jerk before going stiff. As it was standing so close to Vincent's that the barrel of Death Penalty was sticking into it's stomach. A few seconds later it screeched. Vincent jumped back, the neon green of it's blood, burning against him, as it exploded into a mix deathly gray and neon green.

"The metal disappeared too..." Riku noted stepping back to avoid a bit of green blood flying towards him.

"Anything attached to it is part of it." Riku turned around in surprise. "Sephiroth!" The experiment of Hojo and Vincent locked eyes, red velvet and mako green studying each other. "Later Riku. We better move." He finally said. Riku nodded, silenced at his deep calm voice.

Vincent hooked Death Penalty onto his belt and flared his red cloak before following the two silver haired men, noting Riku's hand locked with the older man's. If he hadn't already known, Vincent would have never guessed the man with Masamune had burned this village to the ground.

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

"It didn't merge with Edge either. Whatdya think, kid?" Cid looked back at Cloud, straightening himself. He stretched arching his back, yawning.

"I wasn't expecting it to merge with those who had it's cells for the least amount of time first. I'm no doctor, but I guess it's because those cells wouldn't be so integrated in the victims body." Cid looked up at the crashed gummyship. He adjust his headset. The static was expected. In a few more minutes, Cloud and his ship would be out of communication range.

"Don't look at me. Ansem's Apprentices were the doctors on paranormal." Cid chewed on his toothpick, glancing back inside. The interior was littered with blood, all examined to be Edge's. "Nothing of Cecil left." Cid looked back on the ground.

Tifa had been too shaken up to come back out, so Cid took up the task of "examining the crime scenes." He had started back with the one near the shopping district. It wasn't so much figure out who committed the crime as it was figure out whether or not Jenova absorbed any part of it's victim upon striking. Jenova absorbing it's victim left nothing of it, not even blood. Whether completely merged or not couldn't be determined.

Tifa was instead charged with moping around in the waiting room. It had taken a lot of donor's blood just to keep Yuffie alive. It was heavily debated on whether it was more merciful to just let her die or have her suffer through the healing. She'd be a ninja no more if she did make it; that had been quickly determined. She wouldn't be happy knowing that even Aerith was more useful than her at this point. In the end, Cloud had threatened to chop anyone who even contemplated pulling the plug in half. A very out of character Cloud tearing up and screaming, "I'm not losing another friend dammit! Not to that THING! She's gonna make it!" as tears ran freely down his face. He had then gone on to mumble, "I'm killing her myself if she dies," as he walked out the operating room.

Leon all but demanded that any medical force that could go towards Yuffie did and that he was to be put on the back burner until Yuffie's fate was revealed.

"Cid." The older man walked away from the gummy ship, his spear hooked diagonally on his back.

"What?" He responded to Tifa's clear voice.

"She's stable and somehow not infected." Cid straightened in shock, stuffed his hands in pockets. He certainly wasn't expecting that. "It's a miracle, eh?" He could hear the smile through his headset.

"No," Cloud replied, static waving over the signal, "That was Aerith doing what she does best." The robotic female voice covered the last words of Cloud's sentence stating, "Signal to Nibel lost. Unable to open communication channel." It boomed almost too loudly in Cid's ear.

Cid had to agree as he headed back towards the hospital. Aerith watched over them all in a way that none of them could.

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

"Tidus?" Selphie stood in front of the golden blond holding a cup of cocoa. Bags were clearly visible under his eyes as he sat on a bench in the waiting room, dosing off and waking up in shock only to dose off once more. Selphie turned to look at Wakka, who was sitting next to him. Behind the trio, Kairi paced back and forth. Right now, only Sora was let in to see his parents, and he had to fight like he was taking on a hoard of heartless to see them. "I'm sorry but he looks like shit." Selphie commented. "Someone needs to get him to sleep."

"He's not going to." Wakka replied taking the chocolate from Selphie.

"Huh-what?" Tidus jumped up looking around before lowering his head again. The morning air was cooler than normal, and dark clouds covered the sky.

"Sora..." Kairi muttered, "Who in the world would do this?" Kairi turned around facing the others.

"You mean what." Wakka corrected, "I don't know anyone who can slip a coil up against someone's spine without killin' 'em out right." Kairi slumped her shoulders and took her seat next to the left of Wakka, and to the right of the strange woman dressed in green and gold.

Rydia glanced over at the group. 'No one's weekend should be spent praying for a friend's parents...' Rydia got up stood heading to the reception desk.

"Well, why not?" Selphie wondered, tilting her head as she looked down at Tidus. Wakka shifted his eyes nervously. He felt so small, despite being the largest of the group. Sora was scrawny as fuck and could protect his friends way better than Wakka ever could. And when Sora finally needed someone, not even kind and caring Kairi knew what to do.

"I saw it..." Tidus mumbled. "I saw everything." He whispered. Wakka dropped Tidus' drink, staring straight ahead, shaking as though someone was forcing him to watch a series of real life psychopaths committing their crimes. Selphie outright screamed, her arms hanging limp at her sides as she screamed to the heavens. Kairi dropped to her knees covering her ears and shaking her head. Deep inside the hospital, a wail of "RIKUUUUUUUUU!!!!" echoed through the halls. The waiting room was sent into a panic.

Rydia could only watch. There was nothing she could do. This was his gift. To utilize as he saw fit. This was his curse. To deal with as he only could. Still, she couldn't help but wonder if they had all done the right thing. 'He's just a child.'

Wakka stood with a glare. His eyes aimed directly on Rydia. "You just sat there! You fuckin' just sat there! Why didn't you do anything!?" Tears ran down his face. "You were fuckin' there and you might as well not have been!"

"Wakka she's only human!" Kairi yelled over Selphie's screams. Tidus just sat, staring at his lap. Dozing off. Rydia looked away. The Princess of Heart didn't know how wrong she was. But for someone who wasn't human, she hadn't been very useful. She wondered if Tidus had only dreamed part of the situation or all of it. She would never know.

A security guard alongside a nurse, helped a distraught Sora back into the waiting room. Sora screamed and wailed. Kairi looked up at him, too frozen to move. The images and scenes still fresh in her mind. The way it carved it's name into a screaming and kicking Ms. Hitsugaya all but ignoring the axe cutting through it's flesh, only to be interrupted by a man dressed in black with a red cloak, who had grabbed it's delicate gray-silver locks of hair and sent a flurry of bullets through it as he threw it away from her.

The lady in green had rushed to Ms. Hitsugaya's side. It looked at though she was doing nothing. Just kneeling with her hands clasped. Kairi looked over to Rydia. Selphie fainted, falling to the ground with a shuddering thud before the nurse could catch her.

Sora was still screaming. Built up tears and emotion and energy releasing from deep within him. He knew what it was like to kill. There had been no blood involved, but it had still been a kill. Twelve times...thirteen times...an unimaginable amount of times. So easy to summon the keyblade, cast stop and hack and slash on unsuspecting heartless. Victims and prisoners in themselves. Sora fell to his knees. Almost too easy. Done without a second thought.

**Warning: Slight Graphic Imagery!**

No easier than it had been for the creature to regenerate just enough to have a form, knock the red cloaked man to the side cast stop on the entire area, chop Riku's mother in half and drag her lower half away from the upper half before the spell wore off. At least they were both "merciful" in that aspect. Finishing the kill before the victims could truly recognize the pain they had been dealt.

**Done.** **(At least read the last two lines of the paragraph though.)**

Wakka sat back down, holding his head in his hands. He wasn't even doing anything and he didn't think he could take much more of this. How much more before they all broke? Left with nothing but insanity and dreams to guide and torture them?

"You were trying to heal her..." Kairi whispered wiping her eyes shaking. Tidus fell to the left, leaning up against Wakka, unable to battle sleep any longer. It had been a long two days.

"This case has already been solved." Rydia replied walking over to Kairi. She kneeled next to her. "Kaeli was a good and just friend. She loved Riku dearly, and died to protect him." She stood and walked over to Sora. She kneeled and touched his shoulder, and everything froze. The nurse stopped trying to wake Selphie up. The panic of the waiting room ceased to be. Everything was quite. "Listen well." She said sternly. Sora nodded and wiped his eyes. Rydia looked around at the group with firm yet gentle eyes. "Compose yourselves. They won't remember your actions."

Wakka looked up at her, "What the hell did you do?" His voice was bitter, laced with frustration.

"Stopga." Rydia replied standing. "The police will not be able to fix this or catch it. I'm sure you're aware by now." The group nodded. "This isn't their war."

"Where do we fall in this?" Wakka questioned. He figured the others were way too shaken up to come up with anything.

"Follow Tidus's dreams. Have faith in them." She looked at Sora once more, "Our hands are covered with the blood of the damned to protect the blood of the innocent." Everything began to move again, quietly. There was some confusion from others in the waiting room who had been watching the group in panic. The guard that was holding Sora looked around confused for a few seconds before heading back towards the lobby.

"Is Ms. Tilmitt okay?" The nurse leaning over her asked. Sora, Kairi and Wakka did their best to compose themselves.

"She just...-"

"Fell out of her chair...-"

"Sleeping! Clumsy Selphie for you!" Kairi, Wakka and Sora replied nervously. Kairi and Sora stood. "You saw she was gonna fall so you leaped for her. You're so caring." Sora grinned forcefully. Kairi made note to tell him to never do so again.

The nurse picked up Selphie, "I see. You five should get home. You all look so drained. You're going to make yourselves sick."

"We're fine ma'am."

"Really ya."

"I'd rather stay here just in case there's news about my parents." The trio replied.

"Watch the chocolate ya?" Wakka commented, "Selphie's fall startled me. Sorry, ya."

The nurse shook her head. "Don't worry about it. You've all been through a lot." The nurse stood and walked off. Kairi looked around the room, resembling a lost and confused kitty.

"Guys." She whispered. "Where did that Rydia lady go?"

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

"Benjamin." Rydia looked down at the brunette. Phoebe was on the bed to left. Benjamin lied on his stomach against the mattress, and Phoebe lied on her side, facing Benjamin. Phoebe looked frail and weak, despite little damage being done to her. Rydia guessed she was unconscious from the mental and emotional strain of seeing her husband take such a hit for her. Hearing him scream in pain like never heard before.

Rydia looked at the metal coil up Benjamin's back. "I'm just a memory now." She whispered before taking hold of the coil sticking out of his back. Cool white and green energy channeled up through the coil. Softly Rydia tugged, her image fading and fizzling out of existence as she did so. The coil slowly came out of his back. It fell to the ground with a clang. All that was left on Benjamin's back was a large circular scar. Wafts of green and white energy rose from his limp body.

The doctor who had caught Rydia in the act stood in shock. His clipboard dropped to the floor with a loud clang against the tile. "She just...disappeared..." A multitude of green swirls where Rydia used to stand scattered out through the air, through the room.

* * *

There's absolutely nothing in the world, pertaining to my life, that could justify why it took so long to get this down. Twas plain laziness and focus on other things. Ever tried to break up a crossover story because you made it too vast to work with and in the end you wound up pulling out four to six seperate standalone plots from it? I hope I never do that again. X_X

**Notes:**

Can you guess where Riku, Vincent and Sephiroth are? How about the two "dormant abilities thought to be no more"?

Yuffie bothered me in my sleep, begging to not be killed. *looks around* So she just lost the ability to run about like a crazed ninja in exchange.

"Signal to Nibel..." - Tis an homage to Cloud's hometown. I also thought it fitting for another reason. :)

Could you imagine having a friend who transferred the images of their dreams to anyone who was connected to the friend when they mentioned them? I hope I made it a bit clear that Rydia was just a spirit when she was talking to the "Destined Five". If not, now you know. I was writing this late at night/ early morning.

"...At least they were both "merciful" in that aspect. Finishing the kill before the victims could truly recognize the pain they had been dealt..." - Ever played a bout of Kingdom Hearts and you were so strong you wound up killing the heartless/nobodies before they even had a chance to turn around and look at you?

There was supposed to be another Riku, Vincent and Sephiroth scene after that last scene with Rydia, but it didn't want to go there. In fact, this chapter wanted to end itself after Sephiroth appeared so I'm back down to a four page chapter this time.

And now for something completely different:

Why the heck isn't kneeled a word? It sounds like should be a word. More than most words that aren't "words" for a reason doesn't it? I hate when I run into words like that.


	6. Chapter 6

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters:** This chapter takes us back to Riku and friends.

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** January 12th, 2009 520AM to March 1st 2009 1245AM

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

* * *

Riku looked at the scene ahead of him, amongst the ashen debris that used to be homes of common peaceful folk. Now, he was pretty sure he wasn't the only one who noticed this. The land cut off into a jagged "shore" of sorts. Brown grass and ash covered dirt suddenly cut off by a jagged stream of neon green wafting around in a horizontal uneven circle made up of a continuous loop of vertical waves. The neon green stream even cut off a few dilapidated houses, bits of what little was left of the burned supposed safe havens falling into the stream and disappearing. Beyond the neon stream, complete and total darkness. Worse and stronger than the darkness that Riku himself was used to. The kind of darkness one can't even see their hands behind. The kind that made people wish they were in hell, for even though there was the preconceived notion that hell was a fiery place that burned grief and regret into your soul for a miserable eternity, at least there was some semblance of light there.

"Riku! Come on!" Riku jumped startled in response to the velvet and deep voice. Riku turned around and looked back at the darkness offset by the neon green focusing it one more time before following Sephiroth down the quiet winding road leading away from the Village's remains.

Vincent handed Riku his bag before following him. _"There is no stopping Jenova. It is an entity far beyond Ultima and myself."_ He ignored the faint voice attempting to make him lose his resolve.

As the group walked, Riku found himself studying the back of Sephiroth. 'He...looks like that...thing.' He thought back to the few times he had seen the creature, always charging at him as though he had a target sign on his forehead. 'At least from behind at any rate. If your hair was any straighter you could pluck the strands and use them as needles.' Riku tried his best to smile, anything to keep his mind off the fact that the same thing that had killed his mother and most likely Sora's parents was trying to kill him as well.

He looked at the ground, blinking back a few tears. In a way he was glad that it followed him. He wouldn't know what to do if he found that it was now going after his friends and their families. Riku focused on the soft clicks of Vincent's gold armor covered boots and Sephiroth repeatedly clicking Masamune out of it's sheath and sliding it back in. "Sephiroth? Vincent?"

The older silver haired man slightly tilted his head, the only sign that he had heard Riku, more focused on listening to his surroundings to make sure they'd know if it came back. Vincent grunted out something that sounded like "What?"

Riku swallowed thickly, "What is Jenova, really? Why is it after me?" Riku looked back at Vincent who raised an eyebrow curious. "Well, you did tell me to ask another time."

"You didn't mention you noticed it's name before," Vincent replied. Sephiroth remained quiet, his hand gripped tightly on Masamune's handle.

"It didn't click until just a while ago..." Riku muttered. Sephiroth drummed his fingers lightly on the handle, the long sword twitching slightly with each drum of the finger.

Vincent pursed his lips. He had to find a way to describe her without making him freak out, otherwise he was a dead man from the start. "Jenova is a supernatural being. Hundreds of years ago, it fell to my planet."

_Thick black standard Soldier boots clicked softly against packed dirt ground covered with crystals glowing a light cerulean blue. Neon green left behind with each step of the foot. _

"I know that...I think." Riku replied. "I just want to know what it is."

_ One man, became two. Two men became four, swirls of neon green surrounding them. _

Sephiroth remained quiet, drumming his fingers a bit faster, as though he was bored.

_ The tallest man stared at the figure inside of a particularly large crystal. He reached out his hand, opening his palm and stretching his fingertips towards the crystal. "Mother led us here." The shortest male said._

Riku looked back at Vincent. Vincent eyed him strangely again. "Blame my friend's dreams."

"What information are you looking for then?" Sephiroth finally spoke.

_"We need you..." Footsteps clicked behind them quickly. "...for her reunion." The male with the shortest hair leaped up charging his weapon, and cracked the crystal with a heavy right hook. He then disappeared in a burst of green._

Riku looked at Sephiroth, "What do you mean?" He switched the shoulder his bag was hanging on.

"Jenova is many things to many people." He replied calmly and slowly. Vincent looked away; Sephiroth was right about that one.

_ Shots fired behind the males, covering screams. The shortest male grinned, slicing the crystal causing it to break up and shatter. He too disappeared. They ignored the bullets embedding themselves into their skin, feeling mother's power heal and protect them._

Sephiroth glanced back at Riku, mako green eyes looking down on him. Riku figured that was all he was going to say. As loving as the man was towards him, Riku couldn't help that sometimes the older man scared him. Occasionally he worried him. Riku occasionally felt that something was off about him. He seemed to care about Riku, but something always kept Sephiroth away from him.

_ The tallest man's lookalike fired bullets into the unconscious woman's head as she fell to the rocky floor. He disappeared as well, leaving one surrounded with neon green. Someone screamed behind him. Something metal hit the ground. _

"What is Jenova's purpose?"

"Who knows." Vincent replied, "It exists to destroy most likely. Infecting planets with its putrid cells and destroying it while it uses the planet as a vessel to the next one."

Riku stopped walking. His thoughts disturbed him. 'Does this mean it'll go back for Destiny Islands? Will it get bored of trying to kill me and head back or go to some other planet?' Riku looked up and around. The sky was stuck in this permanent gray, unless it happened to reach part of the world where the neon green stream cut it off.

Vincent placed a hand firmly on Riku's shoulder, "We'll find a way to stop it. It has been stopped before."

_ The remaining one laughed. A laugh full of rejoice. A blur of red, dark blue and black moved to strike only to be foiled again and again by neon green and metal coil. The strongest one, powerless to stop him. This God. This Devil of a being._

Riku looked up at Vincent failing to force a decent smile on his face, "Why don't we just kill it once and for all?"

Sephiroth nearly busted out into laughter. He settled for chuckling instead. "You need to regain your strength. I know of a place we can take shelter for a while." Once again, Vincent agreed. It wasn't that he didn't want to destroy it and get it out of everyone's lives forever. It's just that, no one knew how to destroy it and actually keep it that way.

Sephiroth sharply turned in direction. Riku and Vincent followed, Riku at a slower pace than before.

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

Riku mentally sighed in relief, glad that they had come across their temporary shelter. His feet ached horribly. He only hoped that they wouldn't run into Jenova and get caught in the cave by it. Vincent was first inside determined to scout out the area first. Riku was next, running on his tip toes to help avoid any jagged rocks. Sephiroth was last, walking calm as ever, even though his eyes were downcast.

"Whoaaaaa..." Riku gasped in amazement at the cerulean crystals lining the cave. They all glowed bright the insides of them bursting with white energy. Riku pushed some of his bangs out of his eyes. He slowly entered further, gripping his bag tightly as he past Vincent. "This place is beautiful."

Vincent resisted the urge to blink like a stereotypical hotheaded anime character and settled for scowling. He leaned lightly against the crystals lining the walls of the cave and folded his arms with closed eyes and a shudder. "I hate this world." He mumbled to himself. "Nothing is where it's supposed to be." He was well aware that you had to go both underground and underwater to reach this place, yet here it was in the it-might-as-well-be-open, acting as the inside of a cave in the side of mountain.

Riku set his bag down, and started to change in front of the tall crystal structure sitting in the middle of the cave, surrounded by a small moat of clear cerulean water. "Hey...Sephiroth, how'd you...you know?" Riku mumbled just loud enough for Sephiroth and Vincent to hear.

Sephiroth took his time to think, knowing full well what Riku was asking about. Things weren't looking good. He'd already become too attached to him. "We didn't."

Vincent knew full well to stay out of this conversation. Riku turned around confused, pulling on his two vests. He then stood to put on his pants. In fact, Vincent pretty much tuned this conversation out. He wasn't too sure why Sephiroth had said what he did, but he figured Sephiroth had his own reasonings for doing so. Instead, he focused on the structure in the middle of the cave.

"Seph-"

"I'm going to guard the entrance." Sephiroth cut Riku off turning around. The cave was left in complete silence other than what naturally occurred. The loud drips of the dew building up on the crystals and dripping off, and the water running around the structure. Riku finished dressing and joined Vincent in staring at the structure. Riku swore something white was supposed to be there. Riku scrunched up his face in confusion and thought.

The silence lasted for a good half hour more, occasionally interrupted with the clicking of Sephiroth unlocking and locking his blade in it's sheath. Vincent scowled at the crystal structure thoroughly annoyed, ignoring the dull pain increasing in his back from leaning against crystal.

Riku finally moved, standing. He walked over to the crystal structure and held out his hand towards it, his open palm facing away from him. "There's something...someone? Missing." He mumbled. "Where did they go?" Riku blinked back tears, not sure why he wanted to cry.

Vincent watched Riku interested in his actions, his back turned from the entrance. A small burst of green energy wafted out of the crystal tower, floating around Riku for a moment before heading towards the cave's entrance.

At the entrance, stood a woman with chocolate brown hair up in pony tail tied a few times with a wide and thick yellow hair band. The long white wrap-around dress covering her body and the stole covering her arms and shoulders didn't suit her at all. The dress was ripped and hanging off of her, revealing her lower torso and her legs. She stared at Riku and Vincent with a insane look in her eyes and an equally large fanged grin. The stole fell from her shoulders, disappearing in a burst of green energy.

"I...I had wanted to find dad." Riku turned back to look at Vincent before quickly turning around once more, his hand stretched out through the action. The female took a silent step forward, her hair turning silver and growing in length, the style changing as well from a pony tail to not being styled at all. "I thought that maybe if I found him, mom..." Riku scrunched up his face, refusing to let his dark tears fall, tainting the beauty of this place, "my mom..." The images of her remains played over and over in his mind as though someone set him in front of a television and forced him to watch a slideshow of the image on repeat. "I didn't want her to hate me anymore!" Riku shook, a few tears streaming down his face. "I thought that maybe if my dad was there too, we'd all be happy. Instead, I go on this joyride of Darkness and some weird alien thing kills her!" He stared darkly at the structure. "And I don't even know if that thing is going to go after my friends or anyone else on Destiny Islands!" The morphing woman took silent steps, screaming words she was unable to speak, her eyes changing to a mako green. Riku bowed his head. Vincent shifted his stance to one leg, his red eyes downcast. And the image of a woman with chocolate hair up in a ponytail came to Riku's mind. He had no clue who the woman was, just that she wasn't where she was supposed to be. Riku clenched his outstretched hand into a fist and held it close to his chest. "I can't stop feeling like my family is full of people who can't seem to not fuck up so badly they wind up hurting others."

"R-Riku-Ahh!" Riku and Vincent both turned around sharply. Vincent whipped out Death Penalty, steeling himself to shoot. Sephiroth stood completely off balance, bent over in pain. He gripped Masamune tightly, using it a leverage to stand.

"Sephiroth!" Riku called wishing he could will himself to run up to him to help. Vincent glanced back at Riku, shaking his head before turning back towards Sephiroth. His pained moans from what seemed to be an internal struggle echoed throughout the cave.

He looked up at Riku with pained eyes, green blood dripping from and running down his body. "Please...forgive me." As he spoke the light in his mako green eyes dulled and he stood up straight his head titled to the side and back with a most distasteful grin on his face. Vincent took a step back, taking a few shots at his torso as his wild hair was once more tamed with a helmet marked, JENOVA on the front.

It stretched cracking its neck and bones ignoring the flurry of bullets occasionally jerking its body. "That," Sephiroth's voice spoke out as it looked towards Riku with half lidded eyes as its outfit once again became that skimpy black bikini. Its tantalizing slow footsteps echoed through the cave. "wasn't hard to do at all. I suppose I should send some thanks to that worthless reeking keyblade wielder." It's voice was light and firm, a mixture of voices actually, as though there were multiple people speaking for it all at the same time. It's coughed up a bit of green blood, ignoring it as it ran down it's body and onto the floor.

Vincent moved to shoot at it again, but this time it was too quick. It picked up Vincent by the throat and threw him into the crystal formation, Vincent and Riku's eyes locking as Vincent flew past him. Riku took a step back in time with another of Jenova's footsteps, the splash of Vincent and large chunks of cerulean crystal falling into the moat surrounding the crystalline structure making Riku wince. Vincent's gun landed next to Jenova with a loud clang with enough force to set a few bullets shooting out past Riku's feet. Riku never noticed how close he had been to being shot in the foot, more worried about this thing standing in front of him. "You... What do you want from me! What have you done with Sephiroth!"

"That human was stupid. Unaware that it was me manipulating his actions. Making his control over himself weaker and weaker with each confrontation with a keyblade wielder. And your..." It pointed to Riku with a thin gray finger, "petty allies last two fights with us were...how do you humans say it, 'the straw that broke the camel's back?'" It chuckled darkly before allowing a screeching laughter to take over it.

"What are you talking about!"

"You're as dumb and slow as all the other humans I've run into for these thousands of years." Sephiroth's voice mocked him, much like his mother did back home. "He thought he was smart, a God of all things! Forcing a woman to his wants. A woman he thought would both be able to handle my cells that rampaged inside him and hide from me in a world I'd not yet come upon." It licked its lips of the green blood that ran down them. "Resist _me_! You don't resist death and destruction. You embrace it! DIE!"

Riku screamed as it charged for him, frozen in place. The only thing protecting him from it was a barrier of white energy. It screeched as it came into contact with it, the barrier burning and melting it's skin. The force of the barrier's energy sent Riku flying back towards the crystal structure.

Riku was sure he was going to hit the remains of the structure when someone caught him. It felt more like something however, as he could hear the flapping of wings behind him. Riku looked up to a face of deadly silver and golden yellow eyes. "Don't...scream..." A mixture of Vincent's voice and a second dark being spoke to him. His forehead was covered with his now torn red cape, which also made up his wings, the edges turned thick and black making up the seams. Vincent looked just as undead as Jenova, Riku couldn't help but think as he got a better look at him. The thought distracted him only slightly from newfound discoveries.

Just as Jenova was recovering, Vincent swooped down and grabbed it by it's long hair. swung it around in a horizontal circle a few times and threw it towards the back walls of the cave. Before it hit the back walls, Vincent dropped Riku to the ground, picked up Death Penalty and shot five perfect headshots. All of them hit just as it went crashing into the wall, exploding into a green mist and slime.

Riku stared at Vincent, shaking in fear, both at Jenova and Vincent. He willed himself to run, but couldn't make himself move way too shaken up for doing anything coherent besides standing around in a stupor like Sora does in the first few seconds of a battle. "Vincent...?"

"It tried to freeze me to death. No way am I letting it take me out like that." Vincent mumbled looking back at Riku. He tried to smile assuredly at him, but all it did was make Riku shy away more. Vincent figured Riku was way too out of it to do much more than stand around like a useless teenage schoolgirl and he looked way too much like a cross between a Vampire and Demon to walk around smiling at anyone. They watched Jenova stand slowly, rock and crystal dust falling away from it. It gripped a thick broadsword, still half the size of Cloud's buster sword tightly in it's hands. It's eyes were now red and it's hair now a short messy mop of black and silver with hair on the top of the style gently spiked upwards. "Riku RUN!" Vincent yelled as it charged for them, leaping up and pushing itself off the broken remains of the wall, just as it's outfit changed to a black outfit way too familiar to him.

* * *

**Notes:**

And that, my friends, is chapter six. Hope you enjoyed the yummy Riku goodness. Of all the scenes for this story running around my head, this chapter has my favorite in it. Next chapter is probably the lightest/happiest chapter in the entire story. Yell at me if I don't update by May 29th, 2010.

P.S.: I just realized I haven't been updating the "Characters" for each chapter. -does a little edit-


	7. Chapter 7

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Characters**: Sora, Riku, Kairi, Tidus, Wakka, Selphie

**Inspiration**: N/A

**Originally Written**: March 23, 2009 1208AM to May 06, 2009 (estimated)

**Disclaimer:** Final Fantasy is Square Enix's idea last I checked. Kingdom Hearts belongs to Square Enix and Disney. I've got no rights over those two game series, and I certainly don't own anything more than a copy of the games. No money made here. I'm just a fan writing fiction based on their ideas.

**AN:** What the hell? This chick's still alive? And she's decided to update? :O

* * *

The second Cloud left the gummyship and stepped foot on Destiny Islands, he knew he was wearing the wrong outfit for this world. He mentally sighed, walked back inside, grabbed his buster sword and scanner and left to examine the crime scene, hoping it was still there. The walk was quiet. He didn't have much of an idea where the heck Riku's house was located, so he had picked a random direction. He stared out at the ocean separating him from the main island. "Oh fuck." Cloud facepalmed. Well, at least the gummy ship was out of the way from prying eyes.

He glanced around quickly, glaring at the empty dock. He estimated the distance between this smaller island and what seemed to be the main island, the side of his hand pressed perpendicular to his forehead. He came to the conclusion that there was no way he was swimming that far, no matter how hot it was outside. He also figured that he could launch himself about 3/4s the distance and swim the rest of the way, granted his buster sword didn't weigh him down too much.

He stood pondering for a few seconds before a mischievous glint appeared in his eyes. He turned around, making sure there was nothing to destroy behind him. He took out his buster sword from it's "holster" on his waist. He charged his sword, a purple and pink mix of energy engulfing the blade. He glanced back and measured the distance once more. "All right, here we go." Cloud murmured to himself, downward slashing his sword towards the sand. A wave of energy shot out the sword into the sand, kicking it up into the light breeze. The force of the attack sent him flying back out towards the ocean. Before he slowed down too much for the momentum to keep his feet skidding across the ocean, he supercharged his blade beam attack once more and launched it. The intense wave the move created soaked him and cooled him down as he continued to skid across the water's surface. He repeated the move once more, this time turning around while he was launched to gauge how much further he had to go.

A group of surfers looked at Cloud as though he was crazy, scared out of their minds by the huge sword. A braver group took advantage of the large waves Cloud managed to upstart.

He spun himself horizontally perpendicular to the water's surface before he slowed down too much. Seconds before he plummeted down into the water, he launched his sword towards the main island's shore now only a few yards away. He smirked to himself as it landed point down into the sand standing vertically just as gravity brought him sinking down into the water's depths. By the time he reached the shore, he was face to face with Destiny Island's small police force, all either holding loaded guns or nightsticks.

"Back to the scene of the crime?" An officer asked.

"What in the world are you talking about?" Cloud shook his head and moved to wring out his pants.

"Don't move! You're under arrest!"

The distinct click of a gun being cocked fully caught Cloud's attention. Cloud feigned ignorance, trying hard to not roll his eyes. He knew exactly what they were accusing him of. And they were being stupid about it. He figured they knew it too as he calmly let them handcuff him. "On what charges?" Cloud shot back annoyed. He acted out struggling weakly. If nothing but to confirm his own suspicion.

"You're under arrest for the murder of Kaeli Hitsugaya and the attempted murder of Phoebe and Benjamin Kurosaki. You've the right to remain silent. Anything you say or do will be used against you in a court of law." Cloud mentally rolled his eyes. This was pretty much why Your Majesty always warned against getting involved with the order of another world. People distanced themselves in a yard wide arc away from Cloud. Five officers were needed just to lift Cloud's Buster sword. It took another three officers to pat him down through all his black wool, leather and chains to confiscate his belongings.

"No official ID," One of the officers said, "aside from this 'Radiant Garden Restoration Committee badge.'"

"Sounds like official identification to me." Cloud murmured to himself.

Two officers grabbed each of Cloud's arms and walked him off the beach, "You'll be going away for a long time Mr. Strife."

'I'm sure you have to prove me guilty first.' Cloud thought now annoyed. He really had no time to spend up to a day and then some in Jail while Jenova was running around. Jenova could finish merging completely within that time. And if it got Riku...let's just say he didn't want to think about what would happen if Jenova managed to get it's claws on Riku.

"In the car murderer. Watch your head." Another officer pushed Cloud into the back seat of a blue and white police cruiser.

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

Sora stared up at the ceiling in the hallway just outside his parent's room, lying across a few hospital chairs. Kairi preferred a seat on the floor, her arms wrapped around her knees. Things had been quiet since last night when there had been a big commotion concerning Benjamin's sped up recovery. One of the doctors was shaken up, spewing what would have been nonsense about a strangely dressed woman obsessed with green suddenly disappearing in Mr. and Mrs. Kurosaki's room, if Sora and company hadn't had that run in with her last night where she had revealed a touch of her abilities.

Sora sat up slowly careful not to kick Kairi in the head as he swung his legs off the chairs. Kairi looked up at him, and squeezed a hand gently. Sora looked down a her with a soft smile. "I can't sit and mope here all day." He whispered to Kairi. So badly had he wanted to. To stay in the hospital until he knew that his parents were alright. But he knew he had to go get Riku. If this, Jenova, managed to carve up Riku's mom and nearly kill his own parents he could only imagine what it was going to do with Riku...if it hadn't already done it already. Sora shook his head; there was no need for him to think like that. Riku had been taken over by the supposed Ruler of Darkness and came out as a stronger better person. For a time, Riku would be able to handle himself against Jenova. Still, he couldn't just leave him out there.

"Hey Sora." A calloused hand ruffled up Sora's hair.

"Tristam." Sora turned around looking face to him. Kairi stood brushing off her skirt. Looks like he wanted to see how his parents were doing as well. Tristam had stopped on by last night. He was the one who had found the distraught doctor. The room was still full of green energy. The doctor noted that the female appeared one more time, although she appeared washed and faded out, and waved to Tristam before disappearing for good.

Sora watched Tristam drift from the occurrences of the room. He didn't know much about Tristam, though, that would never be as bad as him not knowing so much about his dad. All he knew was the two of them were friends, "treasure Hunters slash adventurers" Tristam had said with a laugh two nights ago when he had handed Sora the bombs. Sora remembered wondering if Tristam and his father had ever run into any of the worlds that he had during his travels. He'd have to check when things weren't so crazy and depressing. When things returned to normal and he was saving the universe from the people in it.

Suddenly the strange thought that this Jenova could be doing just that entered his head. He blinked a few times before not-so-likely whacking his head into the wall. The bang that resounded along with Sora's shout of "Ow that hurt!" 'caused the doctor checking up on Sora's parents to come rushing out of the room. It also woke Tristam out of his trance of memories.

"The hell?"

"It's ok Sora. I'm sure your parents are alright." Kairi put a hand on his shoulder. Tristam couldn't help but think if Sora was indeed so worried about his parents and wasn't trying to remain optimistic for everyone else amongst his shock, that he would have done barged into their room a long time ago.

Sora looked at Kairi confused, "Wha-?" He blinked rubbing a hand on his forehead, a light blush of embarrassment on his cheeks. Kairi then tightly hugged Sora. Whether to instill some optimism in herself that if Jenova came back to finish everyone on Destiny Islands off Sora would be by her side in the fight, or just to comfort Sora she wasn't sure. Sora hugged back unsure of what was going on outside of his own little battle of whether or not Jenova was trying to make the universe better in it's own fucked up version of a better universe or was just clean off it's rocker.

"Mr. Kurosaki?" Sora looked up at the doctor. She had a calm smile on her face, trying to not show any sign that she had been completely freaked out by the loud noise Sora had created, lest he think that there was something wrong and she was trying to hide it.

"Yes ma'am?" Sora said shakily, all his thoughts back on the state of his parents just behind the door. The nurse held her clipboard tightly and nodded as if assuring herself of something.

"In just a minute, you'll be able to visit. I've just a few more check up procedures to go over."

"Ok, thank you." Sora failed at trying not to turn anymore red when he realized he was still holding onto Kairi, who had released her grip on Sora a few minutes ago. He could hear Tristam snickering, the immature male, behind him as he ruffled up his hair once more.

The doctor smiled sweetly with a hint of "adult-intuition" in her eyes, just as the many times Sora's mother looked at him when he mentioned Kairi at the dinner table. Damn, Sora hated that look. "No more banging your head into the walls dear."

"Yes ma'am." Sora nodded releasing his grip on Kairi. He moved to sit down, Kairi and Tristam joining him as the doctor went back into the room. Sora stared at his lap, trying to clear his mind.

"Your dad saved the world once." Sora and Kairi looked over to Tristam wide eyed. "Your mom, myself, even Kaeli had helped him. "And even Reuben..." Tristam looked up towards the ceiling, resting his head back on the wall.

"Reuben?" Kairi picked up the courage to ask. Sora was shaking. The thought that his Dad was a hero was almost too cliché to not be true.

"Yeah...a friend of ours." Tristam chuckled, "He was so frail. Let a Mummy throw him off a bridge. He was hurt for weeks afterward. But damn could he work that morning star mace." Tristam waved a hand, "Anyway, some crazy Dark King ruler guy had ordered his four henchmen to drain the crystals in our world. Completely threw the planet off into a mix of elemental chaos. What?"

"You're not from Destiny Islands?"

Tristam smiled and shook his head, "Your generation," He pointed at Sora and Kairi, "and a good chunk of the people from the generation before you, are the only ones who can say were born here. Destiny Islands is like Traverse Town, ever heard of that place?"

"It was the first place I landed when I started my journey. It's a place for those who world's are destroyed or no longer inhabitable."

"Sora told me about it."

"It's kinda like that." Tristam grinned, "but way cooler." Sora and Kairi looked at each other and high-fived. "So, yeah, Benjamin had first run into Kaeli when his hometown was crushed by an earthquake which caused a rock slide from a nearby mountain. Kaeli came from Foresta, place was dying from a Flamerus Rex, draining the crystal of Earth up in the Bone Dungeon. Benjamin said it was Kaeli who finally convinced her mother after a good twenty minutes of arguing to let her go with him."

"She wasn't crazy was she?" Sora whispered.

"What?" Kairi looked over to Sora.

"My mom called her Crazy Kaeli." Sora smiled softly, "Ever since she shot me in the leg for trespassing on her property."

Tristam full blown laughed, "Yeah, that sounds like her recently. A few things made her toughen up over the years. It was just her way of coping..."

"With what?" Sora asked.

Tristam shook his head, "Later noseypokes." Tristam ruffled up Sora's hair again. Sora scrunched his face up in annoyance. "While Benjamin and Kaeli were making their way up to the Bone Dungeon. Kaeli got poisoned by a Minotaur."

"A what?" Kairi leaned forward to look at Tristam better.

Tristam grinned, "It's a bull...I think. That stands on two legs. Wields a double sided ax."

Kairi tilted her head to the side cutely. Sora scratched his head. "What's a bull? They both asked. Tristam laughed, Kairi and Sora eventually joining him. "We're serious."

The door to the Kurosaki's hospital room opened. "Sora!" Sora grinned jumping up, his eyes brimming with tears.

The nurse standing at the doorway turned around sharply, "Benjamin! Please get back in your bed!"

"Sora get your butt in here!"

Sora rushed through the doorway, Kairi shortly behind. Tristam stopped at the doorway, leaning on it. Sora's dad stood between his bed and Phoebe's, IVs in his right arm, posing and stretching. Sora grinned. "Dad! You're alright!"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Benjamin grinned, wild brown hair flopping down against the side of his face.

"Please Mr. Kurosaki-"

"No worries ma'am." Benjamin placed the side of his hand perpendicular and horizontally against his forehead, "I'm looking good!" He sharply posed turning to the left away from the beds, "And feeling fine!" He sharply turned the other way. Then he pumped his arms before freezing up. "Ow." He groaned nearly collapsing next to the bed. Phoebe slept soundly in her bed.

'He's just about as dorky as Sora.' Kairi thought looking at Sora who smiled sheepishly.

The nurse rolled her eyes and hurried over to him, "I told you you need to rest your back Mr. Kurosaki."

"I'm still feeling fine-OW!" The nurse slowly helped Benjamin on his bed, lying on his stomach.

"You behave yourself." The nurse said with a smile wagging her finger.

"Yes ma'am." Benjamin looked over to Kairi, Sora and Tristam with a grin. "I'm alright see?" Sora ran over and kneeled by his side, gripping his hand tightly. He was sniffling and wiping his eyes. Kairi smiled sweetly, while Tristam looked away. "No sword wielding thing was gonna take me out. You know this Sora. I'm stronger than that."

"Yea..." Sora nodded. He looked over at the nurse. "What about mom...?"

"She's in a stable coma. The experience must have been very traumatizing for her. We can only hope she wakes." The nurse kept eye contact with Sora, gripping her clipboard tightly against her chest.

"She means, she'll be fine in time." Benjamin wiggled his fingers in Sora's hand. Sora nodded.

The nurse moved to leave stopping at the doorway, "This was nothing short of a miracle." She whispered. Tristam watched her leave down the hallway.

"Sora." The Keyblade wielder looked up at his father. His voice had gone from happy and carefree to serious. "Listen well." He looked over at Kairi and nodded. Kairi stepped forward. "I know you're not going to listen to what I really have to say, so I'm just going to say this: If you _ever_ run into it...Jenova...you will know. Do _not _toy with it. Don't let that thought ever cross your mind."

"It's gonna come after me, isn't it?" Sora steeled himself, unable to stop himself from shaking.

"Only sooner because I know you're going to try to find Riku. Traveling the worlds is in your blood. Nonetheless, I have so much faith in you my son."

"I won't let it hurt or kill anyone else." Sora growled out tears streaming down his face, "It better start praying it doesn't ever run into _me_."

Tristam looked back, "You've got a thick skull just like him."

"Hey!" Benjamin yelled.

"This thick skull got me many victories." Sora nodded in reassurance.

"If you think just pounding on it is going to work, you'll be sorely disappointed. You need a strategy. If only we knew how it worked fully." Sora looked down at Benjamin. He needed to come back. He had to. The last images of him with his father were _not_ going to be him lying in a hospital bed. He needed to find Riku. That thing wasn't going to kill his best friend. It just wasn't. He was a good guy. They all were the good guys. They just had to win. Then...why didn't he feel like they even had a chance...?

Kairi took Sora's other hand in his own, attempting to ignore the gaze of Sora's father on her own eyes, calculating her. She breathed in deeply, before looking down at Benjamin with a nod and speaking, "Sora, I want-"

Kairi glared at Tristam as her words were silenced by a peculiar cellphone ringtone of moderately paced heavy guitar and lighter electric guitar. Sora jumped thrown out of his own thoughts. Benjamin had just barely heard Kairi and was now staring at her back surprised. This frail girl...wanted to go with his son? Against Jenova!

Tristam held up a finger and moved to leave, "Sorry, gotta take this." He left Sora and Kairi to get Benjamin back to bed.

"About time you picked up."

Tristam's eyes widened to the familiar voice. "Cloud?"

"No, it's the candy man." Tristam swore he saw Cloud rolling his eyes on the other side of the phone signal.

"Hardy har har, you're a few hours late Mr. Bigshot." He glared at the tiled floor, leaning back against the wall. "Where are you?"

"I'm in jail."

Tristam blinked a few times before standing up straight. Cloud, Mr. Save-the-world-with-a-straight-face was in jail? Tristam snickered, "What do you mean 'you're in jail'?"

Cloud sighed annoyed. Tristam could hear what he assumed to be handcuffs jingling in the background, "Last I checked, 'I'm in jail' only meant one thing."

"Smartass." Tristam muttered with a grin.

"They think I'm Jenova."

Tristam's laughter rang through the hallway, causing a few nurses to glare at him as he paced through the halls. He held up his hands in defense and then moved to leave the building, "That would be a Godsend."

"Don't I know it." Cloud replied with a heavy sigh. "I need you to do a few favors. I've got 2000 munny back on Nibel."

Tristam shook his head strands of dark black bangs swaying gently underneath his off white hoodie, "I'm not worried about payment." Tristam clenched a fist. That jerk Jenova nearly killed his treasure hunting buddy. He was just about at Spencer status too. The fact it took out Kaeli made the whole ordeal all the worse.

"Don't you dare go and do anything stupid."

"You mean aside from what you're about to ask me?" Tristam smirked.

Cloud sighed. They really didn't have time for this. "Check out the scene, head back to Nibel and then report what you find back to Cid. When you're done with that, come bail me out. It's hot and stuffy in here."

"Will do Princess." Tristam pushed open one of the doors to the waiting room, winking and smirking at a particularly lovely young nurse. He snickered as he heard Cloud growl and take a deep breath. He hung up on Cloud just as he started screaming. "Told him not to wear that hot ass outfit here." He stopped right in front of Wakka, Tidus and Selphie. Selphie was busy reading an offworld novel he had come across in his travels with Spencer and Benjamin. He figured anything to get the young girl's mind off of Tidus' vision dreams was a savior.

Speaking of Tidus, he was snoring and drooling all over Wakka's clean shirt. Wakka failed horribly at hiding the look of annoyance on his face. " 'ey Blitzballer." Tristam placed his cellphone back into the holder on the side of his light matching pants. Wakka looked up at him with tired eyes. Selphie continued reading. Sora's dad's friend was weird...and slightly disturbing.

Tristam and Wakka locked eyes for a few seconds. "What do you want?" Wakka asked. His voice was stern yet quiet and weak. Tristam mentally shook his head. God forbid Jenova come back; Sora and the others were so drained of energy that it would be a miracle if they didn't get killed by it because they fell asleep right in front of it. 'Have a bit more faith in them', he tried to tell himself to no avail. He couldn't shake the feeling that they were seriously gonna drop dead at it's hands if they ever came face to face with it. They were just children after all.

"Benjamin's up acting a fool. Phoebe's on some kick ass pain medication. Girl's out like a light."

Selphie looked up from her book, "Does that mean we can visit now?"

"Pretty much." Tristam waved a hand as he moved towards the exit. "I'll be back. Gotta meet with a fellow associate." Tristam left, sticking his arms in his pockets. Wakka and Selphie looked at each other. Then Wakka proceeded to elbow Tidus, "Quit washing my shirt wit yo' drool man!"

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

Tristam eyed the scene before him. Yellow caution tape surrounded the entire block. The only missing pieces of the scene were Kaeli, Benjamin and Phoebe's bodies. "Thank goodness I don't have to work to figure out what killed Kaeli and how." He walked underneath the yellow tape holding out his scanner. "Took just the cells within her." Tristam looked down, "Even if they did manage to save her, she'd still die within a few months. It's like she knew." Tristam looked around. Dried blood coated the streets, a permanent reminder of what happened. Someone had come along and closed the door to the Hitsugaya household and there was blood on the grass to the left of the door as well as on the wall of the house as well. The remains of two Giant Axe's were left scattered across the scene. Bullet holes littered the ground and even a few small areas of the side of the house. "But then again, we all knew. It was only a matter of time." Tristam left the scene, closing his scanner and sticking his hands back into his pockets, "You can't run an experiment like the one we did and not expect it to come after you. I _really_ don't want them to get involved."

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

"I think they forgot they're in a hospital." Tidus yawned stretching once more. Selphie was sitting in a chair next to Mr. Kurosaki's bed, reading her book. Wakka was leaning over her reading as well, only out of boredom. Sora had previously taken this seat after hearing Kairi demand to be allowed to go with him to find Riku. Now the duo was outside arguing over the fact their voices getting a touch louder every few minutes.

"Did I just read something about a vampire sparkling?" Wakka looked up at Tidus.

"What? Lemme see." Tidus walked over to the duo.

"Don't turn the page, Selphie. There."

Selphie looked up at the two boys, annoyed, "Excuse me, I'm trying to read."

"Duuuuuddddeeee, Vampires do _not _sparkle. They turn to dust." Tidus nodded.

"I know, ya?" Tidus and Wakka high fived.

"I think it's cute that they sparkle."

The duo scoffed, "Of course you would."

Selphie stood and whacked them both upside the head with the book, "What's that supposed to mean? You do realize you're arguing about something that doesn't really exist, right?"

"Actually, the Vampires in my day hated wind and weapons that shot at them." The trio of teens looked over to Benjamin. He had his arms folded underneath his chin. "It was the Fangpires that hated the heat and burned under flame." Selphie was too stunned to speak.

Wakka and Tidus looked at each and grinned. "You-" "Ran into-" "Vampires?" "Like, the real deal?"

"Of course I did. I ran into Fangpires with Reuben up in the Lava Dome. Then-"

"You walked around the inside of a volcano!" Selphie screeched, "Do you know how dangerous that is!"

"Looks like he came out alive and fine." Tidus and Wakka waved Selphie off, completely disregarding her.

"It's only dangerous when it's about to erupt, otherwise it's awesome...save for the heat. We both were wearing heavy armor. Bad idea. I'm surprised we both didn't die from heat stroke down there." Benjamin grinned. "Mount Gale was even worse when I went up there with Kaeli..." Benjamin frowned, falling silent. Selphie looked over to Wakka and Tidus.

Tidus folded his arms and scowled, "Stupid Riku. Why'd he have to go and get kidnapped for?"

"We'll find him." Selphie sat back down, laying her now closed book down on her lap.

"Not sitting here we won't." Tidus frowned.

"And Sora'll never let us go with him. What could we possibly do against that thing? We'd only get in his way, We know this ya? "

"I care about you way too much to put you in that kind of danger Kairi!"

"And that's exactly why I need to go with you! And if you think you're not letting me go, you've forgotten who you're speaking to Sora Kurosaki!"

Benjamin grinned sheepishly. "Told you they were having a lover's quarrel."

An awkward silence took over the room as the small group tried to block out Sora and Kairi's argument. Eventually Selphie smiled softly and spoke, "We won't know if Sora will let us go with him until we ask him. And I bet we're stronger than we think. I bet all of us working together could really open up a can of butt whooping on this Jenova creature." Selphie looked up Tidus and Wakka, "Besides, knowing Sora, he'll get lost looking for Riku and we won't see him again for another two years." Tidus and Wakka snickered. "I bet your dreams'll help guide his and our way, Tidus. An we've all been training back on the secret island."

"Secret Island?" Benjamin carefully shifted to look back at Selphie cocking an eyebrow.

Selphie held up a finger to her lips, "Shh, it's a secret." She grinned. "I bet we could do something."

"You live in a world of positivity Selphie."

"This positivity will come to good use one day." Selphie nodded with a grin.

Sora and Kairi then entered the room again, Kairi had a look of triumph on her face and Sora looked as though he just made a decision he'd come to regret. Benjamin feigned sleeping while Tidus, Wakka and Selphie all looked at Sora and Kairi with nervous smiles.

Sora placed a hand against his forehead and looked at the ground, "You're kidding me..."

* * *

**Notes**

"_Benjamin placed the side of his hand perpendicular and horizontally against his forehead, "I'm looking good!" He sharply posed turning to the left away from the beds, "And feeling fine!" He sharply turned the other way. " - _Yes, Benjamin does this, without the words, after resting at an Inn in FF Mystic Quest. It looks too ridiculous for me to not use it.

Tristam's Ringtone is the battle theme for Final Fantasy Mystic Quest (FFMQ).

"_...He was just about at Spencer status too..."_ - Spencer (FFMQ) is Phoebe's Grandfather. **Spoiler: **When the Ice Golem freezes all the water in their hometown of Aquaria, he gets trapped underneath the tunnel underneath his house, which he was working on to get to Captain Mac (Kaeli's Father) who got trapped in his boat on the mountain side. After Phoebe and Benjamin free him, he runs off with Tristam on a treasure hunt, while the tunnel takes a beating from Phoebe's inability to use Jumbo Bombs correctly. -snicker-


	8. Chapter 8

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Inspiration:** coldrain - time to go & D'espairsRay - Closer to Ideal

**Originally Outlined:** Wednesday June 10, 2009 405PM

**Originally Written:** August 31, 2009 1:20AM to Saturday, May 01, 2010 7:55PM

* * *

**Warning:** Gore for like half the chapter.

_ Yen Sid took a few moments to stare in awe at the battle occurring before him. He, a legend himself, was seeing two beings in a battle that were declared myths and legends themselves. And these two legends were completely decimating Traverse Town's first district. Well one of them at any rate. The helmet wearing being didn't seem to care what they hit to get to the bandanna wearing man. _

_ He wasn't phased too much as he heard the helmet wearing creature screech as a volley of arrows shot through it''s stomach. Pools of green blood appeared at it's feet, dripping from the wounds on it's body. Yen Sid watched, seemingly impressed as the male pulled a child away from the danger, dropped them off with their mother and shooed them away to safety all while chanting a spell of some sort. The creature's screeching cut off sharply as it looked to be encased in stone. _

_ Yen Sid heard the man speak softly as he took a black bow hooked on his back, and prepared to shoot an arrow, "I learned this from a Black Mage with a heart of gold, and a Knight with a strong sense of honor." The arrow was enveloped in a red glow, and burst as it hit the creature. The being was engulfed in flame and exploded into tiny pieces. _

_ "Hmmm...I've only seen that done with a sword." Yen Sid commented, catching the male's attention. Silver eyes stared back at him. Yen Sid's eyes widened slightly, as the male took a few precious seconds that could have cost him his life, to bow, kneeling on a knee. "Stand Firion." Yen Sid couldn't help mentally smiling to himself, as he was regarded with such respect even from a man he'd only heard about. _

_ "You should leave Yen Sid, sir." Firion nodded once before standing. Hooking Yoichi bow back on his back. "You're strong, but Jenova always has something up it's sleeve."_

_ "As do I." Yen Sid replied. It's essence already had oozed out of the concrete rock, dissolving it like acid as it shuffled around on the ground like a thick goop into a single mass. Yen Sid made sure Firion was watching as snow flakes surrounded his form. Firion quickly caught the hint, and began chanting his own spell. _

_ Firion finished first, to his surprise, "Blizzaga!" The mass of green was encased in a relatively large prison of ice crystal. Yen Sid finished next, with a simple wave of his hand. Firion watched in awe as his ice crystal was trumped ten fold by a series of ice crystals and walls, resembling a jagged dome. The dome took up a piece of the accessory shop AND the bar. _

_ "That should hold it for a while." Yen Sid replied, lowering his hand._

_ Firion would have laughed if he wasn't in the presence of one of the greatest magicians ever to exist. "Five minutes if it takes its time, three if it moves at a normal pace and one if we managed to make it angry." The duo quickly got their answer as the dome was shattered apart and Jenova screeched, looking up at Yen Sid with a glare that said it wasn't about to let such a powerful being get away. _

_ Large shards of the dome were cast out in multiple directions. Firion dodged and jumped on the clumps of ice, and Yen Sid took shelter from behind a building. It charged towards Firion, screeching. Firion drew Ragnarok and sliced down at it's head. Meanwhile, Yen Sid chanted another spell. 'So...this is Jenova's power?' He thought to himself. _

_ Firion gasped as Jenova caught his leg when he moved to dodge. Suddenly a couple of the large chunks of ice fell on Jenova like an avalanche of rocks. The area was silenced, save for the sickening splat of Jenova's form, and the squelching of it's blood. "I've never seen a gravity based spell used like that." Firion stood from his place on the ground and jumped back a few feet. "Still, you should leave." _

_ "You're low on both Health and Magic."_

_ "I know." Firion lowered his head, "I'll draw my last breath today, but I will be swinging my sword as I do so." Yen Sid understood. A valiant death for a warrior of 2000 years. Still, Yen Sid could not resist the urge to help in anyway he could. He could tell that his strongest spells were just mere needles on it's backside, and anything else would simply make it screech mockingly. However, if he could take this time to examine it, perhaps he could find some method of weakness for this creature, if one did exist._

~~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~  
_  
_

Yen Sid pulled himself from his thoughts as he sat in one of the seats of Twilight Town's Magical Train. He had found Jenova to have no weaknesses and was lucky to be alive at this moment. The best Firion and himself had been able to do was keep it knocked down. Firion mentioned he was merely holding it off after he declared he was destined to have his life ended by Jenova.

Firion first ran out of MP. And just as Yen Sid predicted, she was too quick to be hit by his strongest spells without a distraction and anything weaker than his strongest spells simply had no effect. Yen Sid had begun to wonder if Jenova was a figment of the devil or the strongest darkness he remembered facing. For it to be so fast...

Eventually Jenova sped up so fast it was nothing a but a blur. Yen Sid had been nothing but impressed as Firion managed to parry every hit for a few minutes. He had made no mistakes. Jenova just became to fast for him. Yen Sid watched while casting a spell as it ripped Firion's right arm off cleanly with a sickening crack. Blood gushed out of the wound like a river. Then it kicked Firion to the ground. Firion kicked wildly at it, just as it burst into flame thanks to Yen Sid.

The flames wore off quickly, and Yen Sid's next spell was cast too slowly. Jenova screeched, Ragnarok lodged deep in it's stomach, Firion's head gripped tightly in it's pale hands by his hair, and one of it's feet pressed down against the fallen warrior's chest with enough force to crush the cavity. Yen Sid watched with widened eyes. He hadn't seen anyone fall like that in a long while. Well over ten years.

Firion's left hand fell from Ragnarok's handle just as Jenova looked to the sky, screeching loudly. Firion's body disappeared in a green mist, which was then absorbed by the creature. Jenova used it's right hand, as it's left was holding Firion's head, to pull out Ragnarok from it's torso. It held up Firion's head as it disappeared and swung it's sword around, pointing to Yen Sid.

The old magician held a tender arm against his chest. He remembered not being able to move fast enough, before he felt Ragnarok's power burning him as she sliced his chest in an unique fashion. He shook his head, remembering how all his training of all his years could not force him to get up and run when Jenova suddenly froze up, Ragnarok dropping from it's shaking hand. Even as he stared right up at Firion's spirit, standing in front of Jenova, willing him to move, telling him to run before he was completely assimilated, he still could not.

It was only from the help of Flora, Fauna and Merryweather that he was sitting on this train today. They had transported him back to Merlin's old home, and patched him. Luckily for him, Jenova did not follow. However, his age prevented his wound from being healed fully and he would forever be reminded of Jenova's might from the scar of the "J" on his chest.

Yen Sid looked up, his face a determined scowl. Now was not the time for reminiscing. He remembered sensing two beings who felt similar to Jenova in Twilight Town. When he arrived, he learned that the poor world was shaken when Jenova took a quiet girl named Fuu, devastating a good portion of Market Street. It was time to find the other.

~~~~~Scene Break~~~~~

Setzer stared at Yen Sid as though he was crazy. He certainly thought he was, and he already thought himself crazy enough for being able to hide out so long surrounded by heartless, using just a set of ten "Darts". "No no no no no. You have me mistaken for someone else."

Yen Sid sighed annoyed. "I happen to know who you are. I know all that goes on this town." He walked around Setzer slowly, sizing him up. "I do believe I know why you are camping here, and I don't believe it's because you're hiding from that group of girls that lack all discipline ever taught and recognized by man." Setzer blinked while Yen Sid walked around him. How could this old man know anything about why he was here? This place seemed like it wasn't even fully connected to Twilight Town.

"Care to take a bet then?" Setzer replied after a bit of thought. "Since you want me off your property so bad, if you can guess why I'm here, then I'll go. If not, I'm staying." Setzer smirked outwardly. Inwardly he was kicking his own butt. What was he thinking? If he got kicked off this land he didn't belong on in the first place, surely that...that...thing would come back and have him for lunch. Probably wind up using his Darts to pick out his tendons and muscle that got stuck in between it's teeth. Setzer straightened his back and tapped his fingers against his pants leg. "So what do you say?"

Yen Sid turned away from Setzer, "I accept, but only because you're being ridiculous."

"Good then..." Setzer folded his arms, "I'm not being ridiculous at all."

"Young man, you've hidden yourself on someone else's property that's infested with magical creatures that could very well rip your soul and heart out and tear you limb from limb because you've the urge to run from that Jenova entity. You _are_ ridiculous."

Setzer frowned. He was getting comfortable camping out here too.

"You do not run from a being of that caliber and strength."

"Then what do you do? Sit and wait for it to strike? Or would you like me to charge at it with a struggle bat and see if it'll drop any orbs that will supercharge me or something?" Was it really his fault that a being that had no qualms about shooting an innocent person in the stomach and then lopping off their arm scared him to death?

Yen Sid summoned a small amount of daggers and shot them towards Setzer. Setzer yelled obscenities at the Magician, never once noticing how he caught them with expert care, even the ones he caught by the blade.

"Quit screaming you whippersnapper or you'll give yourself away without any help." He growled out. Satisfied that he shut Setzer up, he continued. "Now, look at your hands."

Setzer did as told, more than shocked to find that he had caught every dagger Yen Sid had thrown at him. "How-"

"You are a fighter."

"The most fighting I've done would be in a struggle match." Setzer replied.

"And you're not very fair in those either. I know all remember? Now, close your mouth boy. You look like a suffocating fish." Yen Sid called up a "Gravira" spell to quiet down another hoard of creatures. "I"m surprised you stayed here. Then again, I shouldn't be. I'm sure you know you're not from here."

"...What!" Setzer gaped at the magician dressed in blue shocked. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"You don't come from-"

"I know what you mean old man. It's just a saying." Setzer rolled his eyes, "Are you dense? I've lived here in Twilight Town my whole life."

"Of course you have." Yen Sid smiled mockingly at him. They really didn't have time for this. The two stood in silence for a while.

Suddenly Setzer called out, "Staring contest! I win you leave me alone, old man. If you win, I'll listen to you." Yen Sid stared at the young ladies man as though he were insane. Five minutes later, with a bit of magic usage left Setzer frowning complaining about something being in his eye.

"Oh man up already!" Yen Sid yelled heavily annoyed.

Sezter sighed, "Hmmm..." He rested a hand against his chin in thought. Yen Sid scowled and casted a strong Thundaga spell clearing the area of around thirty heartless that were attempting to creep up on them. "Jenova you say? That's it's name?"

"Who knows?" Yen Sid replied, "One could say so, but to give such a creature a name with such dignity behind it would be nothing short of insulting to ourselves. That's what it's commonly called so I hear." Yen Sid turned around, "Is the name familiar to you?" Setzer replied in the negative. He'd remember a name like Jenova. Knowing what the thing was called didn't help to console him at all. "Now, I know you're not going to just sit here and hide."

"Sounds like a good idea to me." Setzer quickly replied. Setzer rocked on his feet, swaying. He almost felt as though he were forgetting something. Something that he really should remember, but didn't want to.

The Master Magician watched him with interested. "You're much like Roxas aren't you?" He walked back up to Sezter.

"Who?" Setzer whispered, falling to the ground. Names with no faces ran about his thought.

"I see what has happened. You've pushed it all to the back of your mind, blocking out the memories."

"What? Memories?" Setzer held his head in his hands. "Don't try to trick me now." Setzer looked up and glared at the magician.

"The only one who's played a trick on you is yourself." Yen Sid wagged a finger at him. "My guess is something traumatic happened in your past, and when you wound up here, you blocked the memories out." Setzer barked out loud laughs.

"You're off your rocker."

"Yes, everyone's off their rocker. Including you." Yen Sid watched Setzer fall to the ground out cold.

* * *

_**Note: **_

This chapter sucks, I know.

Took me a few hours of research on this story to realize that Yen Sid is not Merlin. *snicker* It's a very good thing I'm not a fangirl of Disney Movies. lol

I'm sitting here looking in the Final Fantasy Wiki at Firion's bio, 'cause I forgot what he looked like after not touching this story for a long time, and I saw what Firion looks like in the "opening FMV of Final Fantasy Origins" and I'm going to myself, "That's not Firion! That's an alternate universe Kadaj!"

Ya'll are probably asking yourself why is one of the strongest magicians in the entire series casting spells so slowly? I figure that because this is the legendary Jenova that Yen Sid's come across, he's pouring a lot of energy into each casting, making sure that the spell is strong enough to actually affect it. This increases the casting time needed. Near the end though, it's more that Jenova become that fast.

There's some significance to Jenova ripping off Firion's arm first. I do believe he is right handed.

Um...Setzer's probably not in character...yeah... Neither is Yen Sid mostly likely. XD

And since short chapter's short, I'll probably update again on Wednesday, or when I finish chapter 13, and/or get a portion of chapter 14 banged out. Whichever one comes first. Ya'll are gonna love Chapter 9. At least I do. :3


	9. Chapter 9

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Inspiration:** N/A

**Originally Written:** Saturday May 01 2010 855PM to Sunday May 02 2010 836PM

**Note:** Jenova = Jenova, Jenoviroth = Jenova in the form of Sephiroth, & Chaos Vincent = Vincent in his "Chaos Mode"

* * *

**A/N:** I love this chapter 3

Riku ran as fast as his legs could take him. Still, Jenova was gaining on him. Way to the Dawn was gripped tightly in his sweaty hands. He had lost his bag some time ago, and Vincent wasn't anywhere to be found in his immediate vision.

Riku stopped short as a corridor of darkness, of all the random things to appear in this strange world, showed up before him. Way to the Dawn disappeared as he held up his arms, crossed in an X fashion, creating a barrier around him, as shots fired in the distance. He could hear Jenoviroth, screeching in a mocking fashion and Chaos Vincent growling as he realized he was only helping Jenova with what it wanted each time it missed it and hit Riku's barrier.

Eventually things came to a bit of a standstill, as Jenova leaped out of the dark portal, holding a male with light gray hair up in a ponytail, wearing a dark blue violet sweatshirt, in a headlock.

"...There's...two...?" Riku willed himself to not hyper-ventilate as he heard Tidus' spirit yelling at him that Jenoviroth was standing right behind him and that Chaos Vincent was standing right behind Jenoviroth with the five chambered Death Penalty pressed right up against Jenoviroth's head.

"Riku..." The male stated, seemingly calm for one being held in the grasp of a super God-like alien that was probably going to kill him _very_ soon.

"Stop it!" Riku yelled out as Jenova tightened it's grip around the male's neck. Jenova just stared at him with a deranged grin.

"Luneth..." Vincent stated, "So you went back to Radiant Garden?"

"Yes...I did." Jenoviroth replied, Sephiroth's sultry voice replying confidently. Jenova let go of Luneth's throat and kicked the boy in his leg, causing him to fall to his knees. "Rikku died _so_ easily." Luneth looked off to the side, his head slightly bowed. "Like this." Chaos Vincent barely dodged Jenoviroth when he turned around while lifting up his leg intending on punting Vincent's head right off his body. Chaos Vincent remained silent, save for scowling from being further away from Riku. Jenoviroth smirked mockingly, "You stupid mortals suck at this job." He tapped the top of Riku's Dark Shield with a finger, "Aren't you supposed to be protecting him?"

Jenova grabbed Luneth by his hair, pulling upwards tightly, while standing on his legs so he couldn't stand himself.

Riku steeled himself, "Don't you worry about that. I'll be alive for a long time yet."

"You lie, even to yourself." Riku tried to remain looking confident on the outside. Inside however, he figured the only reason this barrier was still around was Jenova didn't feel like destroying it yet.

Riku clenched his fists, and looked off to the side. Tidus's spirit stood watching the scene with wide eyes. "You killed my mother, and attacked my best friend's parents. You've probably murdered millions of people. If I'm going to die, I'm going to take you with me." Riku swore Tidus was yelling at him that he was crazy. "It ends. Now." He wasn't quite sure what he was saying himself.

Vincent ignored the Chaos part of him that was snickering in disbelief. Unfortunately, Chaos believed that if it couldn't take out Jenova, absolutely nothing could.

Jenoviroth just laughed mockingly, "Bold words. Your father said something similar. And look where that got him." Jenoviroth scoffed, "Tried to help in their plan. Found a woman and with...a bit of force..." the being chuckled darkly, "conceived a child."

Riku's eyes widened, and his fists clenched even tighter. He stared hard into the decaying ground. "...What...?" Jenoviroth smirked behind him. '..I'm the product of rape...?' Riku thought to himself shaking.

"It's-" Chaos Vincent's words were cut off by Luneth.

"It's lying Riku!" Riku looked at the bold man. "Your father wasn't the kindest of men!" Jenova grabbed his hair harsher, pulling straight up. Luneth gasped in pain at the strain on his body. "And he made some horrible mistakes, but he did _not_ rape your mother!"

Jenoviroth gasped softly, shaking, straining to speak.

"He was a valiant man, only reacting to information he thought was correct!" Luneth screamed as Jenova grabbed his arm and snapped it in two like a twig.

"Lu..." Jenoviroth whispered, focus coming to it's eyes.

"He was a good man! Even Cloud would tell you this and he vowed to never forgive him!" Jenova kicked Luneth in his ribs, breaking quite a few of them. Luneth fell silent. Yet was not dead.

"Luneth..."

"Sephiroth!"  
Chaos Vincent groaned something that sounded a lot like "...Shiiiitttt." as Riku dropped his dark shield while turning around. Softened green eyes stared down at him, and Jenoviroth's form shook.

Riku slowly held his hand out, eventually pressing it against the taller man's torso. "...Daddy?"

"...Riku..."

Riku felt that deep within him, he already knew, as tears brimmed his eyes. Jenova grabbed Luneth by his hair even tighter. Luneth drew sharp breaths, gasping in pain.

"I'm...sorry-"

"No! Don't you dare! " Riku called out shutting his eyes tight and bowing his head, shaking it wildly. He gripped onto the leather of Sephiroth's outfit tightly.

"I believe in you, Riku." Luneth whispered, his eyes growing dull. "And I know you can save us."

"-my son."  
"This isn't your fault!" Riku cried, shaking against his frame.

"Sephiroth," Luneth spoke, "we all have forgiven you." Riku froze, still gripping onto Sephiroth's frame. A sickening crack silenced Luneth. Sephiroth watched his eyes glowing, as Jenova kicked Luneth to the ground. His torso was crumpled over his legs and his body twitching slightly. Luneth's head was in Jenova's hands. Deep red blood flowed out from Luneth's neck.

Riku took a step back, tears streaming down his face as Sephiroth looked up to the heavens and screeched, clenching his hands into tight fists. Riku watched his father scream and screech, probably blaming himself for everything, as he still did for causing Sora and Kairi such trouble playing right into Maleficient's and Xehanort's Heartless's hands.

A small human crawled out from under Luneth's body, as his remains slowly faded turning into a a green mist. A loud bang sounded in the area. A loud yell sounded out, a gentle feminine voice different than Jenova's, and the sound of a dull thud and a clank followed afterward.

Riku focused on Sephiroth, who glared the most fierce glare Riku had ever seen on anyone at something behind him. Then he jumped back as Chaos Vincent shot Jenoviroth multiple times in the head. Both Jenova and Jenoviroth disappeared in green mists. However they were also both quickly reforming.

"Move it!" Vincent yelled grabbing Riku's arm.

Riku vaguely heard Tidus yelling as he was led around the mist of Jenova's form. He caught glance at Luneth's eerily smiling head staring off to the side.

"Yuna! YUNA!"

The fairy girl now sitting on Riku's shoulder, looked back confused. "Is someone yelling?"

"YUUUUUNNNAAAA!"

She shook her head, and turned back around, seeing nothing aside from the green mist. She stiffly reached around and rubbed her back. Perhaps shooting a gun while this size wasn't a smart idea. She looked down, noticing she was glowing a calming green. 'He's healing me.' She thought to herself looking at Riku. Rivers of tears were streaming down his face.

"That thing is gonna pay for this!" Riku called out. It was more like a pained growl. Yuna jumped off of Riku's shoulder. She didn't dare sit on Vincent's.

Tidus stared at the retreating backs of the trio, unable to run forward with them. "Yuna..." He whispered. "What is that?" He cringed at the suffocating negative feeling that overcame the area. He caught a glimpse of Riku dressed in a strange muscle tight outfit of red and black, before his attention turned back to Jenova and Jenoviroth.

Jenova was leaning up provocatively against Jenoviroth's side, a hand on Jenoviroth's chest, and Jenova's legs positioned so they were on either side of Jenoviroth's left leg. "Hmmm..." Jenova hummed softly.

Jenoviroth wrapped an arm tightly around Jenova, "We forgot one."

Tidus gasped, frozen in place. Could they see him? They were staring right at him. He hoped to all that was light out there that he wasn't the one they forgot. His spirit shook in place, and screams wracked his form, as Jenova flipped over Jenoviroth, who ran forward right towards him.

"AHHH!"

"SHUT UP, DAMMIT!"

Tidus felt something shove him and he landed on the floor, his butt in the air. He breathed heavily, a part of him still wanting to scream. He looked up at a man with black hair and stern eyes, dressed in red pajama pants. His leg was stretched out on Tidus' bed. And he was scowling horribly, bags underneath his eyes.

"It's 3AM in the damn morning. Quit screaming and take your ass back to bed."

"Jecht." Tidus leaned up against his bed. And then he cried. Silently, as not to make his father any angrier, but he cried like he had never cried before.

It was fine when the dreams had first started, but now, they were too much to bare. Jecht stared down at him, folding his arms. "'nother dream?" Jecht lowered his leg.

"N...N...Nightmare." Tidus hiccuped.

"It's been going on for months now. I don't know what to do with you." Jecht turned around. "Shuyin would know." He growled tossing a bottle on Tidus' bed, "But he just had to run off chasing that stupid girlfriend of his, Lenne. Man I don't like her." He shook his head, "Anyway, I'm thinking about letting you see a psychiatrist.

"No no noo!" Tidus shook his head, already knowing there was a bottle of sleeping pills on his bed. With his power, his psychiatrist would wind up needing one themselves. He stared up at Jecht with wide, frightened eyes. Jecht sighed annoyed and left, leaving Tidus to his own devices.

He came back a few minutes later with a bottle of water. Tidus was still crying, but now he was back in bed, curled up against his headboard. Jecht just shook his head and left.

Tidus didn't blame him. He was a complete mess right now. Forget Jecht knowing, he wasn't even sure what to do with himself. He shuddered, willing himself to quit being such a baby. He reached for his phone, dialed a number. He wasn't surprised when the answering machine picked it up.

'Ya! It's Wakka, man! Probably sleeping, takin' care of my bro-"  
"Wakka!" Another voice interrupted the answering machine.

"- or blitzballin' with Tidus my maaaaaannnn! HA!" Wakka grunted enthusiastically.

"Oh boy..." Tidus heard the same voice groan exasperatedly over Wakka's voice.

"Get back to you later! Ya know the deal; wait for the beep, ya?" He hung up and dialed again.

"Somebody be crazy-" Tidus smiled at the moaning, slurred voice on the other end, "Who da hell is dis?"

"Wakka..."

"Tidus? Dude...Ughhh..." He heard shuffling and Wakka groan lightly, "...It's 3:30AM, ya?" Wakka yawned.

"I know..." Tidus heard more shuffling in the background. He figured Wakka just sat up in bed and was now stretching. Tidus sniffled.

"You been crying, ya?"

Tidus just sniffled again. "Can I...?"

"Dude, you crazy." Wakka replied, his voice still slightly slurred, "My door is open for you any time, ya? You know this ya? Stupid." Tidus laughed softly at Wakka's slightly cheery voice.

"Thanks Wakka."

"Ya ya." Tidus could practically see him waving his hand as though it wasn't a big deal as Tidus was making it out to be. A few minutes later he was shuffling towards the front door, a change of clothes, a water bottle, and a bottle of sleeping pills in his bag thrown over his shoulder and his keys in his hand. He was still in his pajamas. Slippers included.

"Don't die out there!" Jecht's voice called out. Tidus' hand froze on the doorknob. And then he calmed realizing that Jecht wasn't even trying to mock the situation like that or anything.

Tidus smiled slightly, "Ass!" He called back before heading over to Wakka's house.

* * *

**Note:**  
Think about how many people Jenova's killed _before_ getting to Gaia (FFVII), cannon-wise _or_ in my AU. Now that's a disturbing thought.

So...was that Sephiroth at the end (with Riku) or is Jenoviroth just a damn good actor?


	10. Chapter 10

**Daddy Dearest**

**Subject:** Kingdom Hearts Series

**Inspiration:** Track 02, "Move" from the "Solanin Original Soundtrack feat. ent"

**Originally Written:** Monday, May 03, 2010 140AM

Huzzah! Still going! -dancey dance- Think this chapter's kinda short. Yay for one scene chapters!

* * *

"You want to go help your friends, then go help you friends already."

Tidus slowly made his way down the hall, stretching, holding in a yawn. There wasn't an extra bed in Wakka's house, so Wakka took the floor and let Tidus have his bed. He was awesome.

"Stop staring at me like that!" Wakka's house was one floor. For two siblings that was all that was needed. Tidus shuffled in his everyday outfit, save for his slippers from last night. He saw Wakka talking to another red-orange haired male sitting in a wheelchair.

"I know that Chappu."

Tidus stopped, not wanting to intrude. Chappu. Wakka's younger brother. It's been just them for as long as Tidus could remember. Their mother died during childbirth when Chappu was born. Chappu got sucker punched too, being a preemie. The end result was Chappu's weak immune system. Their father died of illness shortly after Chappu was born.

Chappu was a lover of surfing. He had bonded with the sea almost as soon as he discovered it. The sea had also paralyzed him from the waist down in a freak surfing accident. Still, occasionally you could find Chappu staring longingly at the sea on the beachside. Wakka wouldn't let him near it anymore.

"You sure don't act like it." Tidus watched Chappu fold his arms. Wakka sighed, staring down at him. "Stop it Wakka." Wakka continued on. Tidus nearly laughed. Chappu tapped a hand against his leg. "...I don't miss mom because I don't remember anything about her. I don't miss dad because I was too young to be affected by his death. And quite frankly I don't want either of them." Tidus leaned up against the wall, knowing exactly where this was going. This wasn't the first time Wakka and Chappu had a spat like this with each other. "Why do you have to smother me Wakka?"

Wakka sighed and shook his head.

"I'm a paraplegic, not an invalid Wakka. Kairi called yesterday. She convinced her father to let me stay over there while you guys were busy supporting each other." Tidus looked up at Wakka who was blinking confused. Chappu wheeled on by Tidus, nodding his head. "Good morning Tidus. Hope you got some sleep."

Tidus nodded in return, wishing he was able to. The only time he got sleep was when he was too tired to stay awake anymore. Which was just about every 24 hours or so. He certainly didn't have the stamina of the others. He figured the only person with less stamina than him, at the moment, was Selphie.

Tidus walked up to Wakka with a slight smile. The two of them high fived. Tidus grinned, "Chappu growing up some more?" Wakka just gave him a look.

"You didn't sleep a wink did ya?" Tidus shrugged, rubbing his eyes. "You can't keep going on like this, man."

"I'll be fine." Tidus looked up at Wakka smiling. Wakka shook his head, noting the bags under Tidus' eyes. He wondered if when Tidus went to sleep and dreamed, he was actually getting any rest. Tidus placed a hand on Wakka's shoulder. "You're gonna hit me for this, but..." Tidus took a breath, "He's not gonna die Wakka."

It was a second reflex, the way Wakka's fist shot out and hit Tidus' stomach. Tidus leaned up against the wall, gasping sharply and falling to his knees. Wakka just glared at him, his arm shaking. There was a common rule between Tidus and Wakka that only they knew. **DO. NOT.** Mention. Wakka's fear.

Wakka wasn't even sure why he had this fear. Where it came from. He had no other fear concerning death besides this one, not even including his own. He also had no fears of being left completely alone. And he revealed a while back that he wasn't even afraid of the ocean taking his brother as the reason why he didn't let Chappu by it. He just...didn't want Chappu to die. He was fine until someone, like say, Tidus, brought it up. Then he went absolutely nuts. So he kept this fear to himself and Tidus, when the boy bothered him about it.

Tidus just didn't understand. Wakka didn't expect him to either. Shuyin was too busy wooing and fucking Lenne to even care about Tidus and Tidus' dad might as well be an alcoholic or just short of invisible. If a teacher asked Tidus to write an essay on family, Tidus would probably wind up writing about his friends instead.

Tidus looked up at Wakka, "He isn't." Tidus coughed, holding his stomach. Wakka's fist clenched again.

"You don't know that."

"He'll be fine 'cause you don't let him live enough to even scrape a knee anymore Wakka."

Wakka hit Tidus again. This time Tidus fell to the floor, "Shut. Up." Wakka walked past Tidus a few steps before turning back and helping him up. "Sorry man." He mumbled.

"It's cool." Tidus just smiled at him. If they were going to help Sora with Jenova, they'd need this kind of strength. Wakka leaned Tidus up against the wall, before walking back to the kitchen. Tidus slid down the wall rubbing his stomach. He was still trying to regain lost air. Tidus just snickered when Wakka returned with an ice pack. He half wanted to tell Wakka, "Don't ever change."

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**Notes**  
-hopes I got at least either Wakka or Chappu in character there.- I never played FFX and never want to if the plot and gameplay monstrosity known as FFX-2 has anything to say about it, but when it comes to Chappu, the wiki says Wakka's a bit of a "mother hen on steroids" and Chappu just wants him to be his brother and cut the shit out.

I chose Chappu's condition because the guy's supposed to be dead. Like dead before FFX even started. Similar to how I'll only mention Shuyin and Lenne in this story. I made the sea injure him because if I remember what I read correctly, that's where his crushed (?) body was found. More like on the "beach/rocks" but still, close enough. Wakka's fear of Chappu dying also stems from this, but don't tell Wakka that. He probably wouldn't believe you anyway.


End file.
